The vast majority of us are law abiding citizens, who wouldn’t even begin to consider the idea of driving without insurance. We see it as a necessary evil, put in place to protect us and our fellow drivers.
We may have a sly old moan from time to time about the cost of our premiums and the difficulty in finding a competitively priced policy. The reality, we realise is, we need it.
Imagine for a second the prospect of having to pay for the repair of both your own car and a third party’s.
Add to this the fact you face prosecution for driving without
car insurance, for which you could receive a fine and possible period of driving licence ban.
Police statistics in reference to uninsured drivers are very worrying. They show that uninsured drivers are 9 times more likely to be involved in a collision than their counterparts. This is due to the fact that they are 6 times more likely to drive a non roadworthy car, 3 times more likely to have been convicted of careless driving and worst of all, 10 times more likely to have been convicted of a drink driving offence.
Are these the sort of people you want on the road? Ask yourself that question. The answer will most certainly be no. So, news that the police are cracking down on this offence can be seen as good? Not necessarily. The police are using the Motorists insurance bureau records to identify the cars that are not listed as insured. The problem comes if you have just renewed as the records may take a day or 2 to update. This ordinarily would not be a problem, but for a very small number of people who may be randomly stopped, they could appear not to have
motor insurance. As was the case for one motorist who was stopped had his licence plate checked and deemed not to have insurance (although he’d just renewed it that day). His car was then impounded and he was told he would have to pay a fee to have it released, when he could provide paperwork to substantiate his claim. This is more than just an inconvenience and can be seen to undermine the positive effect of the initiative.
Obviously this is just one of a few isolated cases and on the whole the initiative is helping to remove hundreds if not thousands of uninsured drivers from the roads.
“Well what can I do to make sure that doesn’t happen to me?” you ask. All I can advise is to have your insurance policy renewed as quickly as possible and carry a copy and company contact details in your car just in case.
