This article informs us that the Ontario government will, once again, consider banning cell phone use while driving, as a matter of law.
Quote:
Durham MPP John O'Toole says he's sick and tired of people being killed or injured while using cellphones in their cars.
So, once again, he'll introduce a private member's bill to ban hand-held cellphone use while driving when the Legislature resumes later this month.
It'll be the third time the Conservative MPP has pitched Queen's Park colleagues to put the ban into law and comes after a weekend accident in Bradford where a woman and her son drowned after their SUV slid into an icy canal as she talked on her phone.
"Cellphones can be a lifeline, but they can also be a distraction," said O'Toole, who figures many accidents and deaths could have been prevented if his bill had been passed when he proposed it in 1998 and again in 2002.
But he shouldn't expect any support from Premier Dalton McGuinty.
"I'm not convinced that we need to ban them in Ontario. I understand there's a law on the books that has to do with dangerous driving and the like," McGuinty said yesterday. "We can't have a law for everything.
"My advice to Ontarians is: if you're using a cell phone when you're driving, be careful. Act responsibly, be sensible and take the necessary measures to protect yourself and others on the road."
O'Toole's bill still isn't as wide-ranging as the total ban on cellphone use recommended by a coroner's jury in 2002, a year after a Ajax man and his 2-year-old daughter died when their truck was hit by a train during a phone call. An inquest heard that Richard Schewe failed to notice the flashing lights and gate at a Pickering railway crossing while on the phone.
O'Toole said the jury's recommendations were never implemented and his bill twice died on the Legislature order paper.
"That's the tragedy of this thing," he said.
O'Toole said he wants all new drivers to be banned from using any technology — cellphones, Blackberries, iPods, faxes, onboard navigation systems or DVD players — while driving.
"And now you've got satellite radio with 300 channels," he said. "How are people dialling and digiting when they should be driving?"
More than 30 countries around the world have banned cellphone use while driving. So have a few American states, including New York. In Canada, only Newfoundland-Labrador bans the practice in a law enacted in 2003.
"It can be very cumbersome to follow through with a conviction, but we still issue tickets," Sgt. Rick Thorne of Royal Newfoundland Constabulary in St. John's said yesterday. He said the law has reduced cellphone use by drivers but added that statistics about any reduction in accidents were unavailable.
The issue resurfaced after the weekend drownings of Cassandra Read, 32, and her 4-year-old son, Taylor Grasby, of Keswick, after their car spun out of control near Bradford and slid into a Holland Marsh canal.
South Simcoe police said Read was talking to a friend on her cellphone about 7 p.m. as she drove along winding Canal Rd. in a snowstorm.
Traffic Sgt. Steve Wilson said police found no mechanical defects in the vehicle that would have caused the accident.
"We'll never know what caused her to lose control," he said, but added cellphones are a distraction even under ideal road conditions.
He said the police community would welcome a ban proposed by O'Toole and lamented the fact the coroner's jury recommendations were not adopted.
"If they were implemented by the Ministry of Transportation, this collision might not have happened," he said.
"We investigate collisions or what appear to be bad drivers every week and it's people talking on cellphones. Some people are more skilled at it than others, but there's always some level of distraction."
Read's cousin, Tracy Hlady, said yesterday she supports Bradford West Gwillimbury Mayor Frank Jonkman's $18 million proposal to shift the canals away from the road. Town officials said 19 people have died in the canals in the past 52 years.
"I want people to get angry," Hlady said. "I don't want anybody else to die."
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Now, I might have been all for this if it weren't for the fact that I just recently got my driver's lisence and rented a car for the weekend. While driving, I recieved a call and answered it. Did I put anyone at risk? Well, I am a very responsible driver and I honestly don't think I did. So, I have a lot of sympathy for drivers who own cell phones.
Now, having said that, there are obviously people who are dangerous drivers while on the phone and, if they were the only people in danger, I'd say let them drive to their deaths. However, I do fear for the innocent bystanders that these drivers may harm while being dumb. So, there may be some merit to the law, after all. I heard that several European countries have already enacted similar laws, as well as two (smaller) provinces.
So, I was just wondering how TFPers feel about this...