my 93 yr old mother insists on driving !

Ah, so it was two separate incidents.

1. Driving at 80 on a motorway. (This can be considered normal in some places such as anywhere near Birmingham or London.)

2. Approaching motorway, starts to turn left to take Eastbound slip road. Realises error. Backs up and does speedy, efficient three point turn (making sure road is clear), continues on over/under motorway to take correct Westbound slip!

My mother is 90 and still driving, with macular degeneration, but will only go on short journeys and will soon give up altogether. When I spoke to the DVLA about her eyesight they said if she feels happy to drive to carry on, thus putting the responsibility on the elderly driver. It's possible that your Mum feels this is on great big symbol of her independence, but if I felt as you do I would openly and point blank refuse to be her passenger, and if this means not visiting then so be it.

Thank you, nfk. Put like that, it doesn't look too bad at all to me.

The hospital does not report to the DVLA, it is the responsibility of the driver to do so.

How many people on here would consider it safe to reverse for any distance up a motorway slip road?

I wouldn't, bkate, but check out nfk's post a few up thread. Puts a different light on it. I wish the OP would come back and give some clearer detail so that we could be sire about what actually happened.

sure

2. Approaching motorway, starts to turn left to take Eastbound slip road. Realises error. Backs up and does speedy, efficient three point turn (making sure road is clear), continues on over/under motorway to take correct Westbound slip.
--------

Firstly, regardless of how efficient or otherwise she managed her 3 point turn, it's an illegal manoeuvre.

Secondly, it is incredibly reckless.

Just think about it....
She would have come down the sliproad the wrong way facing oncoming traffic!

Also, realistically on many motorways in the daytime, cars travelling at speed will quickly appear behind you when you're pratting about doing a 3 point turn and driving the wrong direction towards them, even if the road was clear when you first looked. Imagine if it was a speeding lorry hurtling towards you?

If you accidentally exit at the wrong junction, you continue up the slip road and either get back onto the motorway via the same roundabout junction or drive on to the next junction.

Anyone that cannot appreciate how stupidly dangerous that manoeuvre was really shouldn't be driving. I don't care whether they are 18, 50 or 90!

Driving a car is not a right but a privilege that bestows a moral obligation to be considerate of other road users and not put them in mortal danger!

Exactly Craicon - and it is this casual attitude to driving law that is the nub of the problem.

It's OK to drive at 80, because everyone around you is doing it - No it is NOT OK. It is illegal.
It's OK to do a 3 point turn in a slip road if you do it carefully - No it is NOT OK. It is illegal.

Until driving laws carry the same importance in people's minds as laws against murder, theft, child abuse etc. we will continue with the carnage.

nfk's post was the one I read before I posted mine thatbags. It is, as Craicon says, incredibly dangerous.

Germans, as they often do, have an appropriate word for people who drive the wrong way along a motorway Geisterfahrer which means Ghost driver

She shouldn't be on the road if she can't see or drive properly !! Get her off it before she kills someone. Tell her GP NOW and he will probably be able to sort her out. She has to Renew her licence every three years. He could call her in for a check up.

My OH calls them "Donor Cars."

The hospital does not report to the DVLA, it is the responsibility of the driver to do so

That is not correct. If her eyesight is below the driving standard then doctors have a duty to report it to the DVLA. You do not have to have absolutely perfect 20/20 vision to meet the driving standard.
Your mother clearly does meet it, at present, and this is why the DVLA were relaxed about it.

Until driving laws carry the same importance in people's minds as laws against murder, theft, child abuse etc. we will continue with the carnage

Continue over congesting the roads by piling more and more people into the country and we will continue with 'carnage' (your choice of word does slightly over egg the pudding IMO), regardless of driving laws!

We should remember that the UK, along with Sweden, the Netherlands and Denmark, are the four safest EU countries for road users. We have admitted to this country literally MILLIONS of people who have never even passed a UK driving test and let them loose on our roads. Many have been caught driving very badly far worse than this lady's mother! Why arent you advocating they are all tested in the UK after say three months residence?

BUT I do agree with you about speeding, and it would be well worth the OP speaking to her mother about this, asking her to agree to stop motorway driving and driving at night (given that there will b some sight impairment due to the AMD and night time is the most dangerous time to drive for everyone). She should persuade her mother to promise not to do either of these things.

My DM was notorious for her antics. She drove the wrong way round roundabouts, she once (at night) drove down a flight of stairs into a school playground thinking it was the car park. She was the only person I know who's own fault it was that she got hit up the rear (she suddenly did an emergency stop for no reason half way round a roundabout). There was no way she could read number plates across the road. She really was a nightmare, leaving a trail of havoc behind her. She had MD and was blind in the other eye but STILL the consultant said she was within the guidelines to be able to drive, ignoring us shaking our heads violently behind her back, trying to get her to stop driving. Obviously, Mair, her consultant was unaware that he should have reported her!

I also strongly disagree with people who only drive locally. Statistics show that something like 90% of accidents occur within 1 mile of home.

Nanasam
Sounds like your mum was a bad driver anyway! BUT re eysight you ARE allowed to drive if you are blind in one eye if the eyesight in the other eye is good.
She presumably had passed the driving standard in the good eye since the consultant was hardly lying!

Statistics show that something like 90% of accidents occur within 1 mile of home

Yes but by far the majority are very trivial bumps where nobody is injured.

Accidents go up in rush hour and at night. Driver error is more likly at such times. Older people driving locally are less likely to drive at these times.

You are thinking of risk the wrong way. Over the course of a year due to their low road usage, and usage at quiet times of day, the elderly driver is far far less of a risk to the public than forty year old mum (or dad) in her four by four rushing to work, rushing to pick up toddler from nursery then older kids from school, running them around on dark evenings to football ballet piano!

Its an acknowledged phenomenon that there a 'mad mum' risk between 3 and 4pm when the accident rate goes up!

drink drive deaths still account for about 13 per cent of all road fatalities

Those of you who want to stop the elderly driving might do well to focus on other 'dangerous drivers' such as these, and foreign drivers who do not even have to pass a British driving test!

Young drivers (17-24 year-olds) only account for about 7 per cent of all full driving licence holders and also, on average, drive fewer miles than drivers aged 25 and over. (A typical young car driver covers around 4,000 miles a year in comparison with an average of 5,600 miles per year covered by an older driver). Yet young car drivers made up 18 per cent of all car drivers involved in reported road accidents in 2013.

By this account should people have to wait until at least 21 to learn to drive? Get the boy racers off the roads!

older drivers up to the age of 80 have collision rates that are comparable to those of middle-aged drivers

The comparatively greater fatality rates of older drivers can be accounted for by their greater fraility and lower resilience to injury. It is also accepted that the risk of injury which older drivers pose is predominantly to themselves rather than to other road users

Nothing like looking at the facts rather than the ageist hysteria propagated by the tabloid press and radio phone-in presenters on the very very rare occasions an elderly driver kills a younger person.

I do not think that statistics help at all. It is all about individuals - if an individual driver (whatever their age and whatever their statistical likelihood of causing an accident) is driving in an unsafe manner then they need to lose their licence and be kept from the roads.

I do not think carnage is too strong a word - I have watched these people being scraped up, and worked to put their lives (and those of their families) back together again - carnage is exactly the right word. If that was truly grasped by the general population then the casual attitude to breaking the laws of the road might change.

www.ageuk.org.uk/health-wellbeing/relationships-and-family/are-you-worried-about-someones-driving/

I would also be worried about the safety of other drivers. My late father-in-law had a series of strange accidents in the car - one where he ended up in someone's driveway where the owner's grandchildren had been standing just a few minutes before and eventually we talked him into not driving any more. In a way I think he was quite relieved.

I do not think that statistics help at al

Not when they dont suit your ageist agenda! LOL

absam

Sounds like he had undiagnosed dementia.
This is not the case for the OPs mother who she says is sharp.

The facts show older drivers pose a low risk to other road users, unlike young drivers who are killers!

Other road users are not the question here.

We are responding to a question from topsyturvey about her concerns re her mother's ability to drive.

tt has cancelled her visit and has not got back to us so there is little point in us continuing to be worked up about it.

Not that I am trying to tell anyone not to carry on being worked up, if they want to be.