Half of UK drivers potentially unfit for the road

Have you ever wondered how you would fare if you re-sat your driving test after years behind the wheel? In a new experiment, Kia Motors UK challenged experienced drivers to retake their test, resulting in a shocking 50% failure rate.

This compares bleakly to the national average pass rate of 42% for new drivers. Some of the candidates that Kia challenged had held a full licence for more than 30 years and regularly drove more than 150 miles a week.

Worryingly, half of failing candidates committed a ‘major’ during the examination: a dangerous driving offence for which they’re instantly disqualified. One candidate narrowly missed a pedestrian who stepped into the street between parked cars.

‘Kia Motors’ Driving Test Challenge’ was designed to raise awareness of driving standards and highlight the potentially dangerous traits embedded in long term road users’ driving habits.

Sue Mulcaster, a Kia Motors spokesperson said: “As a car manufacturer Kia strives constantly to improve our vehicles’ safety features. Realistically we hope that drivers won’t have cause to test these safety functions, and by campaigning for higher driving standards, aim to cut down the number of UK road accidents.”

The most frequent fault, committed by all of the driving test candidates, was poor observation. Drivers were lax when checking mirrors and looking over their shoulders to check blind spots; with two-thirds (66%) forgetting to look before moving off. Poor observation, combined with a selection of other minor faults, clocked up penalty points and caused the remaining 50% of candidates to fail.

The candidates were put through their paces by examiner Damien Burke from Blue School of Motoring. He identified the top ten most common sins committed by the drivers –

Undue hesitation at junctions: disrupting the traffic flow and causing confusion for other drivers

Speeding: disobeying the speed limit, especially in built up areas

Positioning in the road: driving too close to the kerb, to parked vehicles or straying across the white lane divider

Following distance: driving too close to the vehicle in front, compromising stopping distance

Signalling at junctions: forgetting to indicate and confusing other drivers

Moving away safely: not indicating or checking mirrors and blind spots, potentially threatening other road users

Control when reversing: not keeping both hands on the wheel

Emergency stop: omitting to check rear mirror before braking suddenly

Safe stopping at junctions: not applying the handbrake when stopping at a junction

Poor observation: lack of awareness of other road users, potential hazards and mirror-checking during manoeuvres

Damien Burke comments: “All of the candidates demonstrated faults in their driving that could compromise their own safety and that of other road users at some point during their test. The general trend among first time drivers shows that boys are overconfident and frequently pulled up for speeding, whereas girls are more intelligent drivers on the whole, but do collect fault marks for hesitation. Despite many years behind the wheel, our experienced drivers demonstrated the same gender-specific flaws.”

In addition to the candidates’ driving test sins, a selection of bad habits also featured across the board. The most widespread of these bad habits were –

Hand / arm crossing on the steering wheel
Coasting
Approaching a junction at speed
Riding the clutch on an incline
Poor anticipation

Damien Burke said: “Seeing that the majority of candidates had held a license for over 10 years, it is expected that some aspects of their driving will have deteriorated – most drivers pick up bad habits and cut corners along the way, however these should be ironed out if the driver is to be a truly safe and competent road user.”