50mg/100ml Drink Driving Limit in Scotland

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I know what you mean Pete, the first time was because I literally had a good few swigs of cider before dropping two lasses home when I was about 18 (2002), my mate asked to pull over so he could roll a fag, we then pulled away but forgot to turn my lights on - before you knew it the blues were flashing in the mirror!
The next was in 2012 - I started a job in April of that year and was invited out for a few drinks with my new work mates, I stuck to 1 pint and then went on the water, I was fine for about a few hours before feeling tipsy - I then found out that one of the guys didn't like me and had spiked the water jug with Belvedere Vodka, on my way home I was driving back but unfortunately my tipsiness got the better of me and decided to journey the car into a rugby field to the side of the road, rolled the car and walked out unscathed - although I was spiked, I took it on the chin and decided it was a learning point, I knew the water tasted funny but carried on regardless so I was still to blame at the end of the day!
I really do get defensive now about others in the family if they've had just a sip of booze, it's just not worth the risk at all, not only to themselves but to others.
 
Vodka isn't tasteless though.
 
It is all very good. Now it makes it finally very clear that no a single drink is acceptable. Hopefully this will be backed by appropriate policing. Drinking culture needs to stop.
 
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I'm afraid your wrong about zero. The breath machines do register a zero, often, as do blood/urine tests by labs. Unless you have had a drink, there will be zero alcohol in your blood stream.
Now, if you were correct, and people did naturally have alcohol in their blood, then that a. wouldn't happen. and b. the courts of appeal in Australia, New Zealand and a few other places would have a field day.
But the neither of those happens.
Not only that, but anyone convicted of a lower level would be able to claim it as a defence.
Now, believe me everything has been tried as a defence to drink driving, from 'it was pickled onions' to 'I eat a whole fruit cake' and I'm bloody sure that 'my body produces alcohol, so its my body's fault not what I drank' would have been trotted out. None of these have ever been successful.
A zero limit is perfectly possible, it is used, and used in civilised countries. It's utter fallacy to think it isn't practical.
 
Is the zero limit actually a zero limit or just so low that it's effectively zero to allow for the fact that some factors do show up at low levels. BTW, a BREATH test can't show BLOOD alcohol levels, all it can do is give a clue as to the presence of alcohol in the bloodstream.
 
BTW, a BREATH test can't show BLOOD alcohol levels, all it can do is give a clue as to the presence of alcohol in the bloodstream.
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Oh gosh...Thats means that everyone convicted since the early 80's cannot be guilty! A good thing you spotted that and what a shame that the finest medical minds and lawyers missed it for so long, it'll make PPI look like childs play!!

Ok, serious, thats utter rubbish. The amount of alcohol in breath is directly proportionate to the alcohol in your blood stream. Thats why it's not usual procedure any more (and hasn't been for around 30 years), to take a blood or urine sample. Unless you blow very close to the limit on the evidential breath machines.

It most certainly does therefore show blood alcohol levels.

In any case, as I said, before we had breath test machines a drivers blood sample was taken, and was often zero.

In Aus & New Zealand the limit in most states is zero, meaning nowt, nothing, nil, none for young drivers, and in at least one state for PSV type drivers.
 
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This is very topical up here just now (as you'd expect) and particularly at work as we've got our Christmas party next week. I'll be driving home the day after (130 miles) so I've chosen not to drink at all, even though it'll be 18hrs or so between the party and driving. The decision was made easy and it not all that different to what I would've decided to do last year, or last week even, but the new limit makes it clear - act as if the limit is zero. That's the message that the public seem to have heard, so that's a good thing.

Everyone up here seems to agree on that part, no more "ach, one pint will be ok" stuff. In that respect, it's much clearer than the old law. Whether it will stop "habitual" drink-drivers is another thing - the limit was arguably not considered by them in the first place so the fact it's lower will not make any difference. What it has definitely done is get people thinking about it, and that's also a good thing. The morning after is no longer an option, if it ever was.

For me, I enjoy a beer and don't have a problem with the new law but I'm not sure what the aim of it is as the main offenders will carry on anyway. To me it just makes the decision-making much easier.

Andy
 
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Bernie174 said:
Unless you have had a drink, there will be zero alcohol in your blood stream.
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You keep repeating this Bernie, but repetition doesn't make it true. Have you any information to back it up?

Here's an interesting scientific paper. Endogenous production of methanol after the consumption of fruit by W. Lindinger, J. Taucher, A. Jordan, A. Hansel and W. Vogel, published in Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research, vol 21, issue 5 (1997). [link]

Here's a extract from the introduction:
The blood and total body water of human beings contain endogenous concentrations of ethanol and methanol of typically 0.2 to 0.8 mg/liter and 0.5 to 2 mg/liter, respectively. (These values correspond to 0.05 to 0.20 ppm of ethanol and 0.15 to 0.6 ppm of methanol, respectively, in the breath.) These concentrations are of endogenous origin, which is still incompletely understood. Partly, they may arise as fermentation products in the gut; however, ethanol has been identified in the blood and tissue from germ-free rats, indicating endogenous formation independent of the microflora in the the gut. Also, methanol is a trace product of mammalian intermediary metabolism. A typical human body produces up to 30 g of ethanol/day and 0.3 to 0.6 methanol/day. This amount is obtained from an endogenous methanol production of (0.3 ± 0.1) mg/liter * hr-' reported by Gilg et al., which was also confirmed in the present investigation.
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Now that's really not a lot. But it's not zero.

The paper goes on to show that eating fruit (1kg of apples in this case) can cause the methanol levels to increase by an order of magnitude. But not ethanol. Obviously if you're drinking then it's (usually) ethanol you're putting into your system rather than methanol, but I wonder whether the blood tests make that distinction? If you have little or no ethanol in your blood, but lots of methanol, is that still illegal? I suspect it probably is, but I don't know.
 
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You keep repeating this Bernie, but repetition doesn't make it true. Have you any information to back it up?
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As I said, there are Countries, Aus & New Zealand where the limit for some classes of driver is ZERO.

Again, I'll repeat it, just about every defence has been tried out by lawyers, not just in the UK, but in Aus & NZ as well. While the zero bit isn't relevant here, what is, is that a residue body produced amount of alcohol could be, if you were correct the difference between loss of licence employment and much more besides.

Guess what, no one's successful managed to do it, here or in NZ, or Aus. So what does that tell you?

Of the three breath tests I've taken, I have been zero on all of them. The last one being 2 hours after I'd had a drink. Of the people I've nicked where blood was taken, around 50% were zero (I refer you back to the folly of using the old crystal breath test kits!). The rest were above the limit.

So the reason why I keep repeating it is because those are the facts on the subject, the limit is zero in a number of countries, Aus & NZ (for some classes of drivers) being good examples. They manage to enforce it without any issues, so it is enforceable, it is possible.

The product tested for is Ethonal.

See this paper

https://www.umassd.edu/media/umassd...awreview/umasslawreviewtechandlaw/workman.pdf
 
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Bernie174 said:
As I said, there are Countries, Aus & New Zealand where the limit for some classes of driver is ZERO.

Again, I'll repeat it, just about every defence has been tried out by lawyers, not just in the UK, but in Aus & NZ as well. While the zero bit isn't relevant here, what is, is that a residue body produced amount of alcohol could be, if you were correct the difference between loss of licence employment and much more besides.

Guess what, no one's successful managed to do it, here or in NZ, or Aus. So what does that tell you?
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It tells me that you do not appreciate the difference between "zero" and "not much".

It tells me that you have not been briefed, and you have not troubled to educate yourself, on the underlying science.

It tells me that you have not considered why there have been no successful legal challenges. Two immediate possibilities spring to mind. One is that the testing apparatus cannot reliably measure the small amount of alcohol which can be naturally present in the blood. Another is that the machines are calibrated to read slightly low, so that the small amount of alcohol present in the blood cannot make the difference between passing and failing. There may be other reasons, of course.

It tells me that you have not read the paper which you referenced, because if you had you would have realised that it is irrelevant. It is specifically and only about breath testing, and it discusses how (and how much) alcohol gets into the breath once it is present in the blood, but it takes as a given the fact that there is alcohol in he blood and doesn't address the question of how it got there.

All the above, taken together, tells me that you have a relatively closed mind on this subject, that you do not wish to engage in debate, and that you do not like it when your authority is challenged.

Hope this helps.
 
Stewart.

The purpose of pointing you at that paper, which was long and dull was to answer your question, remember Ethanol or methanol? So thats answered that.

Please don't assume you know what's in my mind, apart from it not being possible, you're very wide of the mark.

Drink drive results have been challenged, ad nausea in the UK and abroad. Both originally when every positive breath test was followed by blood/urine test and latterly when we went over to breath testing for evidential purposes.

So far no ones succeed. The reason being that they are accurate and show exactly whats in blood/urine. If its zero, then guess what, it shows zero. It has too, simply because if it didn't show exactly what was there for any one person, it would throw into doubt every test from that point onwards. I can say this based on seeing the results can you? No thought not.

You are right though, breath tests do tend to come back lower than blood tests, whether thats intentional or not, I've no idea. The point though remains valid though, you can have a zero BAC limit, some countries already do, and they manage perfectly well. No amount of pointless argument from you, based on assumptions is going to alter that.
 
Someone let me know when the pi55ing match is over.
 
Stewart

There's nothing to listen too.
The fact is that zero enforcement is possible, and had been enforced for years in a number of countries.
Now if the way they test ignores quantities below a level of x, or whether the tests show everything doesn't really matter, it is being done.

tells me that you have a relatively closed mind on this subject, that you do not wish to engage in debate, and that you do not like it when your authority is challenged
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Is an exceptionally childish response. You aren't challenging my 'authority' and you aren't debating. There's really nothing to debate, the Aussies, Kiwis and others are doing it, so yes, it's doable here as well. Will it be done here? No, not in my lifetime.
 
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