Road Safety Bill [HL]

Well, there are hard cases. I assume that the noble Baroness would emphasise that people are all too well aware of the consequences of breaking the law and therefore are careful. Our objection to the noble Baroness’s contention—apart from the extreme difficulty this year of taking lessons from the Australians in any aspect of our national life—is that we do not like the idea of a signal that says that when someone qualifies he should keep to a negligible consumption of alcohol, but a few months later he is rather more qualified because he has had experience of driving so he can safely take a little more alcohol, because the law allows him to do so. We are not convinced that that is good practice. The noble Baroness contends—with great accuracy, I have no doubt—that of the citizens of New South Wales are law-abiding by nature, but we would be concerned about that signal in our society. We would be concerned about a situation where we said to new drivers that they could not drink alcohol, but that when they got a bit more experienced, they could take a little more. That seems to be exactly the wrong path to take to reduce—I give way to the noble Baroness.