New Zealand refuses to ban cell phones
· Date: 2003-01-05
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The New Zealand Land Transport Safety Authority has excluded banning cell phone
use while driving from a list of proposed law changes recently put up for public
consultation. Research does show that cell phone use is distracting, says the
LTSA, but hand-held and hand-free phones are equally distracting. Enforcing
laws against hand-free phone use would be too difficult, the Authority maintains.
It would be difficult to prove someone was using a cellphone at any given time,
without corresponding law changes that required users to disclose phone numbers
to police and empowered police to access and search cellphone records. At the
same time, there is insufficient evidence to show that making it an offence
would reduce crash rates. Read
NZ Web article
- Some fact on cell phone use (Canada)
- Survey of cellphone legislation (2000)
- Drivers.com on technology and driving
- NZ Land Transport Safety Authority
