Safer roads

The statistics are damning. New Zealand youngsters in the 15-19 age group are 60% more likely than their Australian counterparts to die in road crashes.

They suffer an average of about 21 deaths a year for every 100,000 in their age group, compared with Australia's rate of 13.

Minister of Transport Stephen Joyce calls it a "sad indictment", which could be said to be something of an understatement.

Armed with such statistics, the Government has decided to raise the driving age from 15 to 16 and impose a zero alcohol level for drivers under 20.

By the time of the release of the Government road safety strategy yesterday, these moves had become an open secret.

Mr Joyce has foreshadowed them for months and, on Tuesday, Prime Minister John Key confirmed their generic thrust, citing the statistics and adding, "There's a number of factors there.

Driving age is one.

Also making sure we have a zero tolerance for alcohol for people aged under 20.

We've got to have a very clear bright line that says when you get in a car and you're under 20 you don't drink."

Notwithstanding the inconvenience that this will inevitably mean for a small number of predominantly rural families - incidentally, a sector that suffers a high proportion of road deaths - the Government is right on both counts.

Fifteen is too young to be out and about on the road in cars.

Once, of course, cars in this country were a relatively expensive commodity, owned only after years of hard work and saving.

It might be surmised that a degree of maturity and good sense would have been inculcated in the individual in that time.

There were no cheap Japanese imports, the banks operated under much stricter lending criteria, and there were no such entities as finance companies as might be recognised today; certainly none especially designed to propel young men and women, barely past puberty, into the ownership of fast cars.

Likewise back then, the drinking age was 20.

It is now recognised, and the evidence appears to back this up, that the combination of such a low driving age and the reduction in the legal drinking age to 18 has been lethal on the roads.

So the prohibition against any alcoholic consumption for those under 20 either before or while driving is also to be welcomed.

For some, the moves will not go far enough.

There has been a push, for example, to raise the driving age to 17.

The Government has declined to go this far.

But the Law Commission is preparing its final report on the sale of liquor which is widely expected to recommend placing curbs on the age and circumstances in which young people are able to purchase alcohol.

This and the age rise are likely to garner widespread support.

Unnecessary and avoidable deaths on the road, particularly those of innocent victims or bystanders, are unacceptable to most New Zealanders.