Speeding youngsters

Many youngsters in Britain have risked their lives by getting into a car with a speeding driver.

Research by Co-operative Insurance (CIS) and road charity Brake has found that as many as two thirds of people aged between 15 and 25 have been a passenger in a speeding vehicle.

Of these, more than half admitted that they did not ask the driver to slow down despite being aware of the associated risks.

In total, 4,500 youngsters were asked to complete the survey and it was revealed that 65 per cent had been in a car which was driven at 40mph in a 30mph zone or at 70mph on a rural road.

The findings have led to increased calls for changes to be made to the way in which people are taught to drive.

“Now is the time for the government to take action and tackle the problem of risk-taking young drivers,” demanded Jools Townsend from Brake.

“Too many people have died due to a deadly combination of inexperience and recklessness among many young drivers. More will die if positive steps are not taken immediately to educate young people and reform the learning to drive process.

“The government has a duty to society to ensure every young person gets an education in road safety and introduce a more structured system of training and testing novices,” she added.

Young drivers are often forced to pay higher car insurance premiums than other road users as statistics show that they more likely to be involved in an accident.

Tags: road charity brake, half, time, safety, zone, testing

Credit card borrowing falling among homeowners

Rising base rates are causing a drop in borrowing by householders, according to a new report.

Homeowners who are already paying a mortgage on their home are becoming less willing to take up any more unsecured debt as they are beginning to feel the squeeze, a study by Alliance & Leicester suggests.

Commenting on the report, Chris Rhodes, director of retail banking at Alliance & Leicester, said: “Consumers have shown an unprecedented appetite to reduce their unsecured borrowing while their incomes have continued to grow and interest costs on their unsecured borrowings have fallen.

“This will have taken some of the sting out of the latest increase in base rates.”

Despite that increase, Alliance & Leicester’s report suggests that warnings of a return to 1990 levels of strain on UK consumers’ finances would be premature as the base rate would have to be hiked to 8.5 per cent before people would experience similar problems.

However, conclusions of the report are that, while UK consumers are still in the “comfortable” zone of debt, this position could be damaged if there are any more rises in the base rates of interest.

Other findings of the monthly report show that this unwillingness to take on more credit card or personal loan debt only applies to those with mortgages.

In contrast to a drop in debt of an average £197 among mortgage holders, those without a mortgage increased what they owe by £97.

Tags: zone, mortgage holders, rate, conclusions, study, incomes