Driving: Blood Alcohol Limit

Lord Cormack Excerpts

Wednesday 12th December 2012 Lords Chamber

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, it may well be available but I am not aware of it. However, my point is that there is no safe blood alcohol level when one is driving a vehicle.

[Lord Cormack]

My Lords, my noble friend referred to options and the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, asked him if he could specify some of the options. Can he give us at least two of them?

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, one option—and it is only an option—would be to deal with the problem of tragic accidents where several youngsters are killed in one vehicle. These are very distressing accidents and we need to consider whether we should allow a young driver to carry several youngsters. However, there is a contrary argument, which noble Lords opposite articulated when they were Ministers, that that could have an economic effect. It could mean that the system of one sober driver might not work. So we need to consider carefully what the options are to make sure that there are no unintended consequences.