Mobile Phone Use While Driving – Statistics, Research and the Law
Using our mobile phones use has become so integrated into our lives, we may not even know how often we’re using them. We use our phones to email, check bank balances, pay bills, listen to music, take notes, scroll social...
Drug Driving Laws Are Not About Road Safety
In December 2015, the NSW government announced it was tripling the number of mobile drug tests carried out annually to 97,000 tests by this year. As might be expected, the number of motorists being charged with drug driving offences has also skyrocketed....
South Australia Proposes Sensible Defence to Drug Driving
Last month, the South Australian Legislative Council voted in favour of an amendment to drug driving legislation that would provide medicinal cannabis users with a defence if they fail a roadside drug test. The Statutes Amendment (Drink and Drug Driving)...
Not Guilty of Drug Driving Despite Cannabis in System
Northern Rivers region resident Joseph Carrall was pulled over by NSW police senior constable Chayne Foster on 23 June 2015 for a random drug test. The officer asked the driver whether he’d taken any illicit drugs within the last 48 hours, to...
New Rules for Disqualified Driving
On 14 August, NSW attorney general Mark Speakman announced a suite of new reforms to driver licence disqualification laws. The changes, that will begin operation in late October, include pathways for driving whilst disqualified drivers to apply for their licence to be reinstated at...
Government Says Tough New Penalties Are All About Road Safety
They’re a familiar sight on the road these days. Sometimes alone, other times in pairs or groups. There’s no doubt there’s been an upsurge in the popularity of cycling, but having more cyclists on the road has done little to...
MDT Set to Target Cocaine Users
The Australian federal government has been testing the nation’s sewage again in its continued effort to combat organised crime. The National Wastewater Drug Monitoring Program tests for levels of thirteen illicit and licit substances present in wastewater at treatment plants around...
Death of Elijah Doughty: No Justice for Indigenous People
The verdict in the trial of the Kalgoorlie man who fatally ran over Elijah Doughty in August last year, has laid bare the inherent racism in the Australian criminal justice system. Last Friday, the 56-year-old non-Indigenous man - whose identity has...
Top Ten Suburbs for Speeding in NSW
The top ten hotspots for speeding offences in NSW have been identified; and some of them may surprise you. The Sydney suburb of Mascot, near the airport, seems an unlikely place to be caught speeding, as traffic is often jammed...
Driver Who Collided with Cyclists Appeals Sentence
On 16 March 2014, Thomas Kerr was travelling in his black 4-wheel drive northbound along Southern Cross Drive in Eastlakes, when he ran into the back of seven cyclists from the Eastern Suburbs Cycling Club. It was a dry day,...
