How about Driving with Insurance?

Most young people want to be able to drive as soon as possible and probation clients are no exception. The only snag is that many start driving a bit earlier than is allowed, without the legal niceties of a licence or insurance and often in a vehicle not belonging to them and having been TWOC'd. As a result, many will have accrued quite a string of motoring offences by the time they are able to drive legally, only to find that obtaining insurance is nigh-on impossible due to the premiums quoted. Typically I've heard of figures in excess of £1300 for a bog-standard fiesta. Now it will not come as a great surprise to many when I reveal that this serves as a considerable disincentive to bother with insurance at all, but not necessarily a deterrent to driving. Just out of idle curiosity, or when preparing the inevitable PSR, I routinely ask young people if any of their mates have car insurance. The answer is invariably a bemused 'no'. 

Now what this clearly indicates to me is that many thousands of young people are prepared to regularly drive without insurance and take the risk of being pulled over by the police. Now they, and we, all know that the chances of being stopped have increased dramatically with the advent of Automatic Number Plate Recognition equipment both in police vehicles and via roadside cameras, all linked to a central computer data base. I guess this is one reason they often don't bother to register change of ownership, or provide fictitious details and take a gamble on being 'pinged'.

This is not a good situation for anybody, least of all other road users. I think the time has come for a more intelligent and enlightened approach to the problem, involving a carrot in addition to the stick. If the aim is to get everyone to drive legally, I think we must set up a special scheme that delivers affordable car insurance to this target group. Whilst on such a scheme, young drivers would get used to the notion of paying for insurance and have the incentive to drive responsibly and accrue some no claim discount, ready for eventual transfer to the open insurance market. 

I believe an appropriate historical precedent to consider is the way illegal motorbiking has been dealt with in many parts of the country over the years. As an alternative to a punitive approach, probation officers, police officers and others were typically involved in setting up schemes where young people could ride legally; be properly supervised and in the process learn to be responsible bike users and eventually gain a licence. I think anything is worth trying, rather than allow the present situation to continue with some people having very little hope of ever getting insurance at a reasonable price. I concede that this may not be a good time to be suggesting something else to fund, but it just might prove to be cheaper in the long run for all of us.