Driving a vehicle or being a passenger in one with a driver who is under the influence of drugs or alcohol significantly increases your chances of being involved in a fatal accident.

The Queensland Government regularly runs campaigns for safer driving practices amongst the general population, with some of them geared to our under 25’s.
Many useful strategies have been implemented to deter unsafe driving practices but are we getting the message across and if not, how can we strive to keep our kids alive?

Queensland Transport, in conjunction with the Queensland Police Force, have been instrumental in engaging in aggressive marketing campaigns such as ‘Enough is Enough’, ‘Here for Life’, ‘Back to School Road Safety’ plans and attempts at increasing awareness about driver fatigue  - ‘Driving Tired,’-  and the fatal results that can ensue when doing so.

Despite the vast amounts of time and money spent on waging the war against those battles, we are still not winning it to some degree!

At 17 we hand our children a license to ‘thrill,’ unless we teach them otherwise!  Once they step into a vehicle, they are now the sole captain of that ship. So, how do we give them an appreciation for the big responsibility now at their hands?

Talking with your children about their role as a safe driver is a good place to start. 
Reminding them that it is everybody’s responsibility to keep our roads safe is something that you can start telling them from when they are school-age.  Explaining that their life, and the livesof others, are at stake and that it is their duty to ensure they are thinking clearly and acting responsibly behind the wheel!

Having your children in the car with you gives you a captive audience when addressing safe driving practices, and gives you the opportunity to use your good techniques and knowledge of the road rules as a teaching tool!  If you’re not as familiar with the road rules as you would like, it’s a great time to brush up on them while sharing this information with your family.  You can all learn together, particularly if you have a child in your home who is about to sit for their Learner’s License.

Being a good example to your children while driving is always your first chance to give them a good grounding about how to act when in control of a vehicle. Not tailgating, wearing your seatbelt consistently and not using your mobile phone, even when stationary, sets the standard. You can draw their attention to these good driving habits, creating an opportunity to open up the lines of communication about their safety!  If the phone rings or you hear a message come through, tell your children you will check it at your destination.  Nothing is so important that it can’t wait half an hour or so.  It is better to ‘arrive alive!’  If you think it could be urgent, safely pull over away from traffic and then address the phone call!

It is important to stress that you only get one chance in a car!  Talk to your children about the dangers of bad habits that could hinder their driving ability, or have an adverse effect.  Remind them that having an intense conversation or argument, fiddling with the dial on the stereo or ipod, speeding, driving erratically or with alcohol or drugs in their system are all a fast-track to the danger zone.  While there is the potential to be pulled over by the police, the bigger fear is a fatal or serious car accident that renders them dead or critically injured.  Remind them that they have the potential to take other victims with them!  Should they survive, this is a very large burden to bear for the rest of their lives. Their other victims become the grieving relatives left behind in these circumstances.

One of our biggest concerns about our children driving, or being passengers with others as they get older, is the chance they may get into a vehicle with a drunk driver.  When alcohol is involved their judgement becomes impaired and our usually cautious teens give over to the excitement and as they see it ‘the thrill of the moment – fast cars, good times, and exhilaration!’ If you ask these kids why they do it, why they flirt with death and destruction, they’ll most likely tell you that they don’t know why.  In all seriousness and with a sombre look they’ll tell you they ‘never really thought about it before you raised it.’  You will be mortified at the response and they’ll be shocked you asked and surprised that you are mortified.  In their minds they are young and invincible, which virtually equals immortal in their eyes (they often feel ten foot tall and bullet proof!) and the thought that they could die, or kill someone else, never even enters their heads.  They truly believe that it won’t ever happen to them...  The sad reality is it can, and does, happen to them. Newspaper Obituaries are full of such incidents.

Sometimes when I have been driving with my children, a newsflash has announced the loss of a life, or several young lives, after a drunken night of thrills and spills.  I have taken the opportunity to use this as a very real example of the pitfalls of making these split-second decisions, when they feel infallible, to show them that it can alter and shatter their lives forever; or see a very real end to it.

When discussing this subject with my children I often point out that I wouldn’t go to work drunk and operate a big piece of machinery that could cause death or injury, so why would I drive a car in the same state? Therefore, it is folly to drive drunk or to enter a vehicle with a driver who is suffering from the effects.

I know that this topic can seem brutal, raw and distressing, but what is more brutal than losing your child to a senseless, split second act that could have been prevented with more information, education and communication?

Getting feedback from your children about topics such as drugs and alcohol and driving while under the influence can be a good gauge as to what they’re thinking.  Yes, there are times they will pay you lip-service and give you what they think you want to hear.  But I urge you to listen to your children, really listen – to the conversations they have with their peers, to their responses to tragedy, to specific and targeted messages sent to them via the media, their schools, the police and you!  Get in touch with your kids and their thought-processes.  Encourage their interaction; keep the lines of communication flowing from an early age.  They are sponges and they will absorb a lot of information, even when you think they aren’t listening, they are! 

Giving them a chance to listen and interact is better than giving them no chance... and no chance is what they will have if they aren’t inspired to be mindful of their actions.  Inaction never saved a life!  Being proactive is your first chance to guide them to safety!  It is the responsibility of each and every parent or guardian, to encourage our children to be safe and to keep their friends safe.  Once they have a license they have a duty of care to think before they act!  As parents, and a community we have a duty of care to remind them of this!  Sadly accidents still happen (that’s why they call them accidents) but knowing we have done everything we could do to prepare them gives us more peace of mind, and gives us a semblance of absolution, if not in its’ entirety. 

Ultimately their decisions will be their own!  We may always feel that there was more that we could have done, said, taught or given a cautionary tale about; but when we are there, guiding with a careful hand and a thoughtful heart, mindful of their right to choose, we can rest in the knowledge that we have given them a good start, done our best (all that is humanly possible) to ensure their safety - ensuring that forearmed is forewarned.  The rest is up to them!  You can’t always be there to hold their hand at the wheel.  They are now, in effect, the master of their own destiny...

For more road safety information see details on your State’s transport authority website, RAC applicable to your state or the police department responsible for this area.  You can always arrange authoritative speaking events for ‘at risk groups’ within your school or youth groups to facilitate knowledge about safer driving practices.

Michelle Hayward is a mother of 9, with her over 21 years experience as a parent and a Freelance Writer and Photographer who is about to release her debut novel ‘Falling. Michelle has certificates in Natural Therapies, Aromatherapy, Interior Decorating, and Diplomas in Make-Up Artistry; she is a Nursing & Childbirth Education student.