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http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7043455.stm

Death crash father seeks reform

Louise Jones (far right), with (left to right) Kayleigh Parry, Katie Roberts, Danielle Caswell
A father whose 16-year-old daughter died with three of her teenage friends in a car crash has called for the driving test to be scrapped.
Terry Jones says learners should have to log 200 hours of driving with an older motorist before they can take a car out on their own.

His daughter Louise died in Powys last November in a car driven by a man of 18 who had just passed his test.

Craig Ramshaw, from Ebbw Vale, was convicted of careless driving.

He was banned from driving for two years but cleared of causing death by dangerous driving.

Mr Jones told BBC Radio Five Live the driving test should be scrapped in favour of a longer programme of continuous assessment, akin to what pilots have to go through.

Log book system

He explained what he envisaged: "You have a log book. You've got expert drivers taking them out.

"You're going to have 200 hours of training, but this time, the difference will be they will have to be shown how to drive.


They (17-year-olds) can go from nothing to driving the most powerful cars on our road and that is without having any instruction on the motorways

Terry Jones
Father of car crash victim


"In the light, but in the light then when it's raining, in the light when it's foggy, in the light when there's snow on the ground, ice on the ground, (and) in the dark, the same."

Miss Jones died with Kayleigh Parry, 16, and 15-year-olds Katie Roberts and Danielle Caswell.

They were travelling along a mountain road near Ebbw Vale last November when Ramshaw's car skidded off the road and flipped over.

Last week at Cardiff Crown Court, Ramshaw was cleared of dangerous driving, but given a conditional discharge for careless driving, as well as a driving ban.

His lawyer Patrick Harrington QC said he was "deeply sorry" and hoped that one day the girls' families would forgive him.

Sentencing him, Judge Nicholas Cooke QC said he was too immature to hold a driving licence, both at the time of the accident and now.

'Crash courses'

Mr Jones wants to see the law changed to introduce a pilot-style driving course on which young people would have to log 200 hours with an experienced motorist.

HAVE YOUR SAY
A test should include night driving and motorway driving

Cathy, Milton Keynes


Send us your comments

Learners should also be allowed to drive on motorways, something they cannot do now, and should have to undergo further training before they can carry passengers, he said.

Mr Jones has said previously that he does not bear any ill-will towards Ramshaw, but wants other young people to learn from what happened.

He also criticised intensive "crash courses" which condense the learning process into a few days.

"They (17-year-olds) can go from nothing to driving the most powerful cars on our road and that is without having any instruction on the motorways," he said.

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I agree that Motorway & Night driving should be incorporated into the driving test, surely (if your road legal), insurance costs force younger drivers into less powerful cars.

I Live in Newport not far from Ebbw Vale and the accident on the M4 that lost the lives of two innocent people travelling home from Ireland and the three idiots who were in a car that ploughed into them was right next to my house.

The names of the idiots are now painted onto a bridge about 125m from the scene and there is still a large number of flowers there. In the M4 case the three were equally responsible for the deaths, not just the driver.

In the Ebbw Vale case 6 people made the decision to get into a Corsa and go for a spin! The four girls who were killed were all in the back and were not wearing seatbelts.

While I have sympathy for the family in regard to their loss it is impossible to have sympathy for his views unless he acknowledges that his daughter has a huge responsibility for the deaths of her and her friends not just the driver, legislation and the driving test.

I thought this story seemed familiar...

I have every sympathy for that father for losing his daughter, things like that should never happen to anyone – but in this case it really needn’t have happened at all. Perhaps he needs to look closer to home to find an immediate and effective solution instead of pointing fingers at everyone else.

Earlier BBC article.

Article discussed here.

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Views expressed are personal opinions and are not necessarily shared by the Safe Speed campaign

For 4/4 rear seat passengers to die, I'm guessing that something happened to the vehicle structure at the rear. It's a leap too far to suggest that seatbelts would have saved them in such circumstances.

How do you get 4 rear seat passengers to ALL exit a crashing vehicle?

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Paul Smith
Our scrap speed cameras petition got over 28,000 sigs
The Safe Speed campaign demands a return to intelligent road safety

I think it’s more of a step than a leap.
We know the car flipped; IMO it’s quite reasonable to assume a door flew open.

Forgive my ignorance regarding roller skates, but aren't Corsas 2 door roller skates?

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Paul Smith
Our scrap speed cameras petition got over 28,000 sigs
The Safe Speed campaign demands a return to intelligent road safety

I did a Google to check that before making that post. They seemingly come in 3 and 5 door varieties.

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Paul Smith
Our scrap speed cameras petition got over 28,000 sigs
The Safe Speed campaign demands a return to intelligent road safety

said on the original thread. that I do understand what these families are going through. I think the young lad was maybe swamped by peer pressure here. I cannot say the deceased girls were without some blame. They allegedly pressurised the newly qualified and immature driver to allow them into that car that awful night. I admit that I am lucky in that Will, Nick and Steffi all know the score of what an out of control car can really do. Their earliest childhood memories know what did happen in our family after all. I do worry about our adopted and younger children whose memories are perhaps not quite so graphic

But these girls were over 14 years. They chose to cram into the car. They chose not to wear seatbelts. Does not matter whether the Corsa was 3 door or 5 door. It's loading capacity does not change here.

The young driver's lack of experience showed up here. I have to say that had he been trained in Austria, Switzerland, France or Germany - handlng knowledge and how loads affect handling would have been tested in the theory section or orally after the practical test. (Based on what I read on-line as to "requirements" )

But regardless of the young man's weakness in not putting his foot down (the correct foot on the FLOOR as in "NOT GOING ANYWHERE!" - those girls should have known that seatbelts were required and perhaps not insisted on getting in that car.

But kids :rolleyes: They are deaf to advice at times, Taken by the thrill of the moment.. and they are so assured of immortality that they cease to think realistically.

We;ve all been there. done the dumbest of the dumb things to do. We survived.. fate .. luck. But we all know of pals who did not. Like my mate Chris whose small car managed to swerve.. perhaps in the gale that night. He died. He hit a lamp post on a bend. The other driver on that bend also died. It was the summer of 1977. One year after leaving our School to go to Unis.

Personally - I do think he took that bend too fast for the conditions. I thought so then.. at his funeral .. and still now.

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When vehicle's spin and roll or both you would be surprised what happens to the occupants in the vehicle especially if they are not belted in either in the front or back.

I have dealt with two similar collisions both two door vehicle's were all occupants were not belted and they were ejected through the windows and two were killed and one received serious injuries, and it was thought that this person survived due to the sudden deceleration of the vehicle.

As she was found partly in and out of the vehicle, and it was thought that another rotation of the vehicle and then perhaps a third fatality as she would have undoubtedly been ejected as well.

It is also possible that the roof has come down ontop of them and caused unsustainable injuries coupled with any other forces placed on the vehicle,but whatever happened it is terrible that these young lives have been lost.
Stephen

It's highly unlikely the doors of a modern car like that would have burst open. The latches have to withstand pretty massive loadings and decelerations. I guess it might have been a multiple rollover situation though - in which case I'd expect the windws to burst and it's possible they may have come out through the side / rear windows. As for the roof crushing them, the fact that the front seat passenger was OK, suggests that the roof didn't crush significantly. Due to the need to maximise visibility, the car's front pillars are normally the thinnest so if a roof crush happens, it's often the front section that cops for it worse!