Is it illegal?

Driving back from work today after calling at Tesco’s to pick up some Crabbies Black, I really fancied cracking one open.

Bear in mind this is a 330ml bottle of alcohol, so just over half a pint.

Ignore the fact that it may not be the brightest thing to do, especially if spotted by the Rozzers, but considering you can drink a pint in a pub and legally be driving your car a couple of minutes later – is it illegal to drink behind the wheel?

Technically it’s illegal to drink or eat anything while driving. I think!

It’s been illegal since the 70’s

i had a mate who used to drink a lot of caffine free coke (no me neither) he was always getting pulled over – never worked it out until the PC mentioned the gold can he’d been swigging from!!

1. It’s not an offence to be in possession of an open alcohol container in a public place. Local authorities have the power to create ‘Alcohol Designated Areas’. (They only do this when there are specific problems, related to drinking, in those areas). It’s still not an offence to be in possession of an open alcohol container, or to be drinking from it, in such an area. However, it is an offence within such an area, to fail to stop drinking or to fail to hand over the container, if required to do so by a police officer.

2. A car isn’t a ‘public place’. (Even a taxi wouldn’t qualify as a public place, although it’s arguable that a bus might).

3. It’s not an offence to have an open container of alcohol in a car.

Think the legal limit’s down to abut half a pint fr your average person now isn’t it?

No. It is illegal to be drunk in charge of a motor vehicle. With a clearly defined definition of drunk.

According to the interweb, Crabbies is 6% alcohol, so that’s 19.8 ml, 15.85 g or 2 units of alcohol. Assuming that you neck it, and it distributes in 0.5 L/kilo body weight or 35L, you will achieve a concentration of 16/35 g/L or about 0.5 g/L. That is 50 mg/100ml blood. Pretty close to the 80 mg/100ml limit.

Drink it slowly.

Is it? when did that happen?

Half a pint basically means zero, as the body naturally produces a small amount of alcohol they can’t set a zero limit.

easier to be safe & save your drinking until you get home, or get someone else to drive.

Think the legal limit’s down strength of beers are up so about half a pint fr your average person now isn’t it?

Would be a better interpretation.

djaustin – Member

No. It is illegal to be drunk in charge of a motor vehicle. With a clearly defined definition of drunk.

to be pedantic there are two separate offences – to drive whilst unfit thru drink and to drive with a higher blood alcohol level than the limit.

You can be done for either

Fair point TJ. And the retrospective calculation is valid for a disqualification.

Working backwards from 80 mg/100 ml, a pint of 6.6% bv, drunk quickly, will put the average 70 kilo adult at the limit for driving. Your body can eliminate about 1 unit or 8 g of alcohol per hour. This can be factored into the equation.

Drink at that rate and you won’t get drunk. Drink at more than one unit per hour and you will (eventually).

you shouldn’t really be drinking anything, eating or even holding an apple whilst driving…

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/tyne/4203375.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/4788910.stm

Kev

you shouldn’t really be drinking anything, eating or even holding an apple whilst driving…

And while they are at it, they should nick all those folk who take their hands of the wheel to change gear – certainly not in control!

I s’pose gin is out of the question then

It’s ok if it’s in a brown paper bag!

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=io30s7-5VaQ[/video]

Why the f would you want a drink so bad you would consider drinking it while in charge of a tonne or more of machinery.

Or have I missed a week and its April 1st?

It’s only an offence to drink (water, coke, beer) while driving, if it can be proved to be affecting your driving/judgement.
From the article above:

When it comes to things like eating, smoking, applying make-up, map reading and tuning in the car stereo, they are not against the law but drivers can be charged with careless driving or not being in proper control of their vehicle.

It’s whether or not you fancy your chances when giving the police a good excuse to pull you over.