'Tis the season to encourage young people to drive safely

Even schools serving the most deprived areas have succumbed to the insidious notion that learning should be celebrated by a "big bang" event at which little expense is spared. Near us, there is a pub with a restaurant that has reinvented itself for the prom market and for a period of several weeks, there is a stream of vintage cars and stretch limos - as well as more exotic modes of transport, including a bright-red vintage Routemaster double-decker bus - all bearing school leavers dressed up to the nines.

There is, though, a major advantage to school proms as "official" celebrations in that they are generally alcohol-free and smoke-free environments. No doubt there is some illicit drinking going on, and the odd cigarette, and perhaps more than that, but the staff at the venues know very well that repeat custom relies on their following the rules. So school proms are generally safe events.

That just isn't true for many other less formal celebrations of the end of the academic year. Sixteen-year-olds, sixth formers and students in further and higher education all want to celebrate. But the end of examinations, increased leisure, longer evenings, the availability of alcohol, hormones, peer pressure and, for many, the acquisition of a driving licence and the wheels to accompany it together make a heady mix that can be frighteningly unstable.

When I was a director of children's services, one of my more reliable and saddest predictions was that every summer there would be at least one serious, and often fatal, road crash, most often late at night involving a single car with an inexperienced young driver carrying several young passengers driving too fast and losing control, ending up by hitting a large solid object. Often the evidence showed that there had been drinking, even if the driver was not over the limit, with seatbelts not being worn, leading to victims being thrown out of cars. The inquest reports always made harrowing reading, with the phrase "a tragic loss of young lives" being too often repeated.

Alcohol slows reaction times but boosts confidence, and passengers can distract drivers and tempt them to show off. Most young drivers are inexperienced, particularly at night, and will never have driven with excited passengers. Add to those risk factors driving tuition, which is focused on driving safely and legally, so young drivers will almost never have come across situations in which they are close to losing control.

This all leads to many accidents. According to the RAC Foundation, in 2013 there were 234 teenage passengers killed or seriously injured in accidents where the driver was aged 17 to 19. There were nearly 6,000 injuries overall, including minor injuries. And while this age group comprises only one in 70 drivers, they were involved in nearly one in eight crashes involving death or serious injury. This is not new - when I was working in Dudley, each year at about this time I used to write to secondary school head teachers and college principals to ask them to do all they could to encourage new young drivers to be aware of the risks and to drive safely.

One of the less glamorous developments that came out of the 2004 Children Act was increased co-operation between the police, children's services, schools, colleges and council departments responsible for roads, all working together to promote better road safety for children and young people. Unfortunately, those cultural changes were not fully embedded and in recent years have been eroded - last year, the local college had to fight tooth and nail with the council to get a controlled pedestrian crossing on a busy road dividing two sites.

Nationally, there are some encouraging signs - Patrick McLoughlin, the Transport Secretary, published a green paper in 2013 proposing a minimum learning period before taking the test; enabling learners to take lessons on motorways and after dark; increasing the probationary period from two to three years for a new driver's licence to be revoked if they offend; making the driving test more rigorous; and incentives for young drivers to take up additional training after passing their test. Let's hope his reappointment leads to some rapid action.

In the meantime, if you work with young people at this vulnerable age, do make a point of doing all you can to encourage them to travel safely this summer - and to enjoy their proms.

John Freeman CBE is a former director of children's services and is now a freelance consultant

Read his blog at cypnow.co.uk/freemansthinking