Has everyone seen this?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-30329743
Essentially the drink drive limit in Scotland is down from .08 to .05 from today.
In practical terms it means that most men will be over the limit drinking one pint of beer.
Just FYI.
Most Jocks have that much alchahol in their body all the time just from the fumes from all the Super Tennants they all drink up there!!
Should be a no drink limit like in other countries - want to drink - don’t drive/ride…
they made a very valid point this morning on the news, the hosts were asking whats the point of having such low tolerance might as well have zero tolerance so at least people know where they stand.
this low limit is making it very confusing indeed.
It’s not confusing in the slightest, really. You can have a slice of rum-and-raisin or a couple of chocolate liqueurs. You cannot drink anything. There’s still (and generally always will be) the issue of for how long you may not drink before riding. I’ve met people who will not drink the same day they’re riding a bike, but are fairly happy to get smashed one night and ride home the next morning. That’s probably sailing fairly close to the wind.
The tricky bit about zero tolerance is you find people unknowingly having too little to have any effect at all and so in reality enforcement would steer clear of anything approaching zero just to avoid arguable prosecutions, in the same way as speed limits are often not enforced until the excess is by at least about 10-15%.
I hear you, I think you’d have to accept that it is tacitly zero now in Scotland.
Absolute zero has its problems as well- you could have a dessert with some brandy in it and then be over the limit.
I reckon .02 is the best option in reality.
Actually, someone might know this- is there any law against being a drunk pillion?
Not that I was planning on having one on my bike- just curious.
i know that and its perfectly clear to me, but for the masses if you tell them ‘you cant drink at all’ its much easier than having to work out the amount of units before being over the limit. most people still cant work out the current one, and its been on for a while.
Oh please - then you go for the desert without ‘brandy’ in the name and places which serve food will be required to highlight all dishes prepared with any quantity of alcohol…
pretty sure they have to do that already
They tried setting it at 0.02 a while back in Portugal but you come across a different problem, the human body produces ethanol through fermentation in the digestive system and in some cases people could be over the limit without actually touching an alcoholic drink.
Basically don’t drink and drive.
Isn’t New Zealand zero tolerance? When I worked on the railway that was zero tolerance for everyone including office staff with random drug and alcohol testing on all sites.
Interestingly though and slightly off topic, alcohol is banned on almost all oil rigs, except for Total oil rigs because being French they are allowed wine. But that’s probably more to do with social attitudes towards drink.
figuring out when you are sober is fairly easy, but obviously every person is slightly different so this can be used as a guide only but;
It takes roughly 1 hour for the average human to process the equivalent of 1 unit of alcohol, so if you go out one night and drink 6 pints of 4% lager, you will have consumed about 12 units of alcohol, therefore if you stop drinking at 11 you cannot expect the booze to have been processed through your system till 11AM the following day,(for some, even then there still may be enough to make you over the limit) so if you get on your bike or in your car to drive to work at 8 AM, the very strong likelihood is that you will be over the limit.
so if you are planning a skin full, be very aware of what you think you might have to do the following morning.
“Even at the lower end of the new limit you’re still three times more likely to kill somebody else on the road because of the impairment that you’ve got.”
Says it all really; I’ve never understood why anyone would have a pint and then drive home - it doesn’t really feel any different but it makes you significantly more likely to cause an accident. If I’m driving or riding I stick to soft drinks.
The problem isn’t what the limit is. It’s about catching people who are over. A little like the mobile phone ban.
Unless you start of drinking very slowly and then down pretty much all of your drinks at the end of the night, the time should start from when you start drinking 9or about an hour after to allow your body to start processing it) - perhaps it is a little confusing after all 
God, if takes an hour to get rid of 1 pint of Fosters then after my Lads weekend away a couple of weeks ago i shoudn’t be driving still!!!
There are plenty of situations where you could eat something without knowing it.
Restaurants might have to highlight but you go out to Aunt Bessie’s and have something inadvertently that wouldn’t affect your ability to drive and get done for it.
Or using mouthwash.
This does happen in places like the Czech Republic where the limit is zero.
The problem with an absolute zero limit is anything, even .000001% makes it a criminal offence.
You can also fail a drugs test for having poppy seeds- a friend of mine actually did this.
NZ is .08.
Australia is .05.
http://www.rupissed.com/blood_alcohol_limits.html
I was surprised to see a few countries with no limit.
He probably failed to mention to you he was boiling them in Absynth at the time 
It means that a driver could leave England under the legal alcohol limit but find they are breaking the law once they pass over the border into Scotland.
Just how ridiculous is that.
If a Scottish Court bans someone for driving because they were found to have >50 mg but <80 mg of alcohol per 100 ml of blood do we assume that the ban only applies on Scottish roads :ermm:
