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  • EADD Moderators: Shambles

UK Driving Drug Test....

An even simpler solution to the problem of having to perform a cash transaction per passenger would be just to add another percent to income tax, and make local buses free at the point of use. But that doesn't require expensive, proprietary technology ....

DrGreenthumb said:
It was only a saliva test, they can detect minute traces in saliva, so maybe the story about touching banknotes & then touching his mouth (or food, whatever) could be true. It's an unreliable test that can produce false positives & negatives anyway.
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And a few more similar cases will call this whole law itself into question, as the violation of the principle of presumption of innocence.
 
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DrGreenthumb said:
Maybe there was some other reason for a false positive, but he proved he hadn't taken drugs with a hair test & won compensation in court.

It was only a saliva test, they can detect minute traces in saliva, so maybe the story about touching banknotes & then touching his mouth (or food, whatever) could be true. It's an unreliable test that can produce false positives & negatives anyway.
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Yeh, from that article it appears all that was proven was a false positive, not that banknotes were the cause - I think the reporter may have been using a little imagination there...
 
Ok I have been reading up a lot on this and from what I gather these drugalysers cannot currently detect amphetamine and mdma am I right? Tbh these are the only ones I'm worried about as I don't smoke weed or take prescription drugs.
 
My mate who takes nothing but prescribed meds was on methadone but this new act made him paranoid so he switched to subutex as he needs his license to drive for his job, anyway he did the transition to be told you cant drive if on Subutex unless you have been on it for a year, this sounds like bullshit? The roadside tests cant detect Subutex anyway and he takes no other drugs so should be safe but it seems they are making up their own version of the act as they go along (the service doctors). Seems a bit fucked up and stupid to me but then again the whole system is so its to be expected.
 
deano88 said:
Ok I have been reading up a lot on this and from what I gather these drugalysers cannot currently detect amphetamine and mdma am I right? Tbh these are the only ones I'm worried about as I don't smoke weed or take prescription drugs.
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They can detect amphetamine but not mdma mate -unless they take you for a blood test.
 
Interesting that in Australia they claim they can detect MDMA, although I have always suspected that they were picking up amphetamine metabolites. I couldn't care less, but I think if they are serious they should be more transparent on doses and times. The same problems exist with alcohol, with women for instance not able to follow the standard drink recommendations, and others with tolerance able to drink more. Otherwise it is nothing more than a PR stunt.
 
F.U.B.A.R. said:
It does sound a little far fetched tbh - unless he was licking all the notes he received :) Although many banknotes are claimed to contain minute traces of cocaine, how many people pay bus fares with notes? He would have had to have handled a fuckton of them to get enough in his system to fail a drugs test surely?
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That's kinda the point, no? That he shouldn't have failed the drug (saliva) test but he did anyway. Seems entirely feasible that he could have gotten enough cocaine in, on or around his system to trigger a saliva test fail purely from banknotes. Would be easy to touch the swab with the same fingers used to handle notes which could very easily put the amounts found in his saliva well over the limits - even though the cocaine was never actually in his system at all.

The point is that he knew he hadn't taken cocaine (or any other drugs) so there had to be a problem with the test itself - in this case the fact that it is very easy to trigger false positives even if you haven't used any drugs whatsoever. This is why follow-up blood tests will be vital to prove (or disprove) the initial roadside saliva test results as they are going to be highly shonky.

F.U.B.A.R. said:
Yeh, from that article it appears all that was proven was a false positive, not that banknotes were the cause - I think the reporter may have been using a little imagination there...
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Trace amounts on banknotes are not especially unlikely as a cause for triggering a "false" positive. They caused problems with a previous system used at pubs/clubs that checked peoples skin for traces of drugs too for the same reason. Thing about "false" positives for cocaine is that there aren't many other things that could trigger for cocaine other than cocaine. Maybe some of the *othercaines that are mainly used for dentistry or OTC sore throat meds might but most people would likely know they had come into contact with such things and be able to point them out as potential sources for false positives. Banknotes have cocaine on them - it's not an urban myth they really do.

(wonder if anybody has ever considered trying to extract the coke from every note they come into contact with for, say, a year - sure it could be done in theory at least)
 
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5StarSquatHotel said:
My mate who takes nothing but prescribed meds was on methadone but this new act made him paranoid so he switched to subutex as he needs his license to drive for his job, anyway he did the transition to be told you cant drive if on Subutex unless you have been on it for a year, this sounds like bullshit? The roadside tests cant detect Subutex anyway and he takes no other drugs so should be safe but it seems they are making up their own version of the act as they go along (the service doctors). Seems a bit fucked up and stupid to me but then again the whole system is so its to be expected.
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I was talking to one of my DSP nurses about this kinda stuff this week and, frankly, she freely admitted to having no idea what was likely to happen in the real world. She was amazed that a lisrt of specific substances and concentrations had been made available when I mentioned this thread and was rather vague on what she thought would happen in situations where people were on prescribed meds. To be honest, she sounded far more optimistic than seemed reasonable to me...

Her general opinion seemed to be that people on scripts would be exempt from these new rules as long as they carried a doctor's note with them stating that they were prescribed whatever meds they were on and that the doctor deemed this person fit to drive. To be honest, it kinda sounded like she was pulling it from her backside cos I really can't see how that would work - how the hell would a doctor know how a person's driving was? And I've heard nothing about magic get out of jail free cards for the scripted. Kinda sounded to me like there's a bit of a company line being applied to try to brush off legitimate questions and concerns and make it seem like it really is just as straightforward as drink driving laws when it is obviously a more complex beast that will take quite some bedding in time.
 
Personally i don't see how prescribe meds differ from illicit drugs. Both can affect a person in different ways. Subs, strangely has a similar affect on me as codeine did in that if I'm inactive / sitting down I can becoming tired n almost start nodding off - but if I'm up n active, stimulates me.

What I'm basically saying is that, if buprenorphine has that affect on me who's to say that it won't on a potential driver? A few seconds nodding off n BANG! Each individual driver are not only responsible for his/herself, those in the vehicle but also anyone on the road, including pedestrians.

In situations like this a person's "rights" must be over-ruled in the name of safety. To me the only difference between prescribed n illicit is that illicitic, more often than not is cut with other substances, whereas prescribed are often the proper stuff, it coming from a pharmacy n what-not. So the argument tbat a person on prescribed meds should possibly bipass this test n be allowed to drive on a doctor's say so is weak n ludicrous.

Sorry.

Evey
 
BecomingJulie said:
An even simpler solution to the problem of having to perform a cash transaction per passenger would be just to add another percent to income tax, and make local buses free at the point of use.
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I already pay stupid amounts of tax for the "luxury" of being a motorist. Why should I have to pay another 1% income tax for public transport that I'll never use?
 
curious_24 said:
I already pay stupid amounts of tax for the "luxury" of being a motorist. Why should I have to pay another 1% income tax for public transport that I'll never use?
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I agree. I can't drive n thank fuck. Me ex had a car n shoulda seen the amounts he paid to run it. It was a peguet (however you spell that) deisel n of course, I helped out with the running costs just for the pure sake of spiking his stuck up parents who loved to show his 900per week n her 600per week cash fund. There was MOT + plus costs if that failed, road tax per 6 months, fuel, other up keep costs, general parking costs etc, etc, etc.

It ain't cheaper forking out taxis. For the local town which is 7 miles I pay a tenner. A TENNER!!!!!! And then the driver silently wants a tip which s/he can be waiting for until dooms day as I'm
A tight git when it comes to tips.

I can't moan about buses as everyone on DLA in Wales gets on free.

I'd imagine more more tax would cause ourageous.

Evey
 
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Shambles said:
Y'know some of your NI contributions go towards paying for gynaecology on the NHS too. It's a fukkin disgrace.
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Very good.

I just think there has to be a better solution than blanket tax increases. How about we bump income tax up a few more percent and abolish road tax and fuel duty? While we're at it, bump it up even more and do away with alcohol and tobacco duty?

Where do we draw the line?
 
BecomingJulie said:
The point about taxation and subsidy is that you might be paying more in taxes, but some of. the things you have to pay for today would be free. So you would end up better off.
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That's all well and good if you use most of the things you're subsidising, or if it will allow you to reduce your costs in another area.
 
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