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The Department for Transport (DfT) has revealed that an amazing 1 in 4 drivers who died on our roads in 2017 wasn’t wearing a seat belt. Official figures revealed that 1,793 people were killed on UK roads last year. Of those, 27% were not wearing a seatbelt, up from 20% the previous year.

The fine for not wearing a seatbelt is currently £100 which rises to £500 if the case goes to court. Clearly, this isn’t enough of a deterrent. As much as we hated Jimmy Saville his clunk click campaigns worked but what on earth causes drivers not to belt up when they get into a car? It just doesn’t make sense. We need some new campaigns to make drivers aware of the dangers that still exist.

On to cars:

Cars are exposed to dangers as a result of ineffective speed bumps. A survey carried out by Confused.com revealed that over a fifth of drivers had experienced car damage as a result of speed bumps with repairs costing an average of £141. Whilst not classed as a road defect local authorities have paid out over £35,000 over the last two years in compensation.

Confused.com surveyed 2,000 motorists of whom 22% reported damage caused by driving over a speed bump of which there are 29,000 in the UK. Tyre damage was the most common – in 48% of the cases followed by 33% reporting suspension damage. 41% felt that speed bumps caused too much damage whilst a quarter said that they did nothing to reduce speed – probably the drivers who sustained damage to their cars – idiots!

Advice from Confused.com’s motoring editor, Amanda Stretton was to check the height of the speed hump if they sustained damage whilst driving at a reasonable speed to see if you qualify for compensation. Might have been handy to explain what that height should be! By Graham Hill

A company has been set up to deal with end of lease or rental charges when consumers or businesses receive excessive charges for damage repairs, excess mileage and late or missing service history. They will fight your case on a now win, no fee basis and so far they have had a success in 66% of the claims they have handled.

On average they have recovered £355 per claim for their clients which represents about a 54% saving on their original bill. The company takes a 30% cut of the money refunded or saved. Whilst I feel that these guys could help out most of what they suggest will be covered in my PCP report as end of lease charges are the same whether you take the car on a PCP or on a PCH.

The biggest issue for most is hiring a car abroad. You return to find that your credit card has been used to pay for some repairs to the hire car that you weren’t even aware of with no proof that damage had been caused. In those cases an outside agency could be really useful.

In the meantime download my 200 page guide by visiting www.grahamhilltraining.com  By Graham Hill

You should do if you are a driver of a fairly new diesel car. However, according to Fleet News, less than a fifth of drivers are aware of the existence of a tank of AdBlue in their cars and what it is there for? They were quoting research by Radius Payment Solutions (RPS).

RPS, a fuel card business, investigated driver knowledge of AdBlue which revealed, despite most new diesel vehicles having a tank, 90% had never used AdBlue.

The survey also found that despite associated environmental and health impacts, more than 25% had no idea about the benefits of the product.

As I’ve explained in the past, AdBlue is a fluid treatment that is injected into the exhaust gasses. It can filter out more than 90% of harmful NOx emissions converting into steam and nitrogen, resulting in less pollution.

They suggest that the AdBlue tanks need to be filled every six months, often during servicing, however, the rate at which cars use AdBlue varies depending on how economically they are driven, the engine size and total/average mileage.

This means that business drivers who tend to be on the road for longer will need to understand what AdBlue does and certainly where the filler cap is. The report says that average consumption of AdBlue is around one litre every 600 miles but could reach up to a litre every 350 miles depending on how the car is being driven.

The range between refills ranges from 3,000 and 12,000 miles, meaning some drivers will top-up their AdBlue reservoir at least once between normal servicing. My car is now 3 years old and I have never had to top my car up between services. Some manufacturers offer larger AdBlue tanks as an option.

Jonathan Haseler, Regional Director – UK at Radius Payment Solutions, said: “For something that should be a regular maintenance check like filling oil and screen wash, the findings are certainly surprising. Our cards help facilitate the purchase of AdBlue, making it easier for companies to adhere to emissions standards whilst offering consistently transparent pricing.”

Bit of a sales pitch there. What people also aren’t aware of are the constituant parts to AdBlue. It consists of urea, found in Urine, pigs urine to be more precise. I’m so glad I shared that. What the report doesn’t mention is that your car won’t run if you run out of AdBlue.

Whilst you should have plenty of warning you should know where the filler cap is, sometimes by the fuel cap sometimes in the boot. The car will warn you when it is out and as long as you don’t stop the engine it should continue on. But as soon as you stop the engine it will no longer start again till the AdBlue is topped up. By Graham Hill

If you’re like me you’re probably getting sick to death with hearing about it every single time you turn on the news or a political programme but it’s already starting to affect us. But we also have to be aware of the fact that Brexit is becoming a bit of a ‘catchall’ for all things wrong in a variety of industries.

Mini is bringing its ‘planned annual maintenance’ forward to 1^st April 2019 just after we officially leave the EU. This will mean that the factory will shut for a month whilst they carry out urgent repairs but most understand that a slow down in sales has resulted in a drop in demand.

So they will shut the plant for a month to carry out ‘maintenance’ whilst the order book hopefully recovers. The official reason is that immediately following Brexit they could run into a major parts supply issue so they are taking precautions sooner rather than later – really?

In my view they need a change in design. You have to add in a Chili Pack to any of the models to get to the basic spec. of most competitors. The rates are keen but compared to the latest designs of A3, Golf, A Class and 1 Series the Mini is no longer current. Up the spec. levels and make the cars funkier. Low sales have nothing to do with Brexit.

In addition to the Mini factory shut down Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) have announced a 3 day week at their Castle Bromwich production plant affecting 3,000 workers. Again down to poor management. The factory builds XE, XF, XJ Saloons and F Type sports cars. Having been given the new emissions test rules in September 2017 they had a year to meet those standards.

It is my understanding that when their cars were tested they were failing the new tests which meant that they had to change the design of their cars to bring down the emissions. In turn, they shut down their order book and when customers couldn’t get their new Jaguar they simply turned to other manufacturers such as Mercedes, BMW and Audi.

The Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders have expressed concerns for a bad deal or no deal Brexit. The average new car price is set to increase by £1,500 when imported into the UK under WTO tariffs with our exported cars into the EU increasing by £2,700 making our cars less attractive with the production plants potentially moving to the EU.

And not just the car builders, there is a raft of manufacturers that will feel the negative results following Brexit. From car carpets to dashboards there are component manufacturers that may feel the need to set up plants in Europe as the new duty charges and cost in delivery, especially if we see queues at the ports, result in costs increasing significantly.

The problem is that I’m not seeing a solution. Whilst most leavers that I know believed in the rhetoric that was being bandied about at the time of the vote that the likes of Germany and France wouldn’t want us to have no trade deal – which I believe is true but if I was in Belgium, Austria and say the Netherlands with no car manufacturing, seeing the opportunity of enticing UK manufacturers into their countries would be a great encouragement to vote no at any deal.

Time will tell but I’m seeing some very painful times ahead. Getting out is one thing but getting out with the right deal is something completely different. By Graham Hill

New rules came into force in May with the most controversial being the visual test applied to diesel cars. I mentioned in earlier posts that the examiner now has to look at the tailpipe of any diesel to see if there is smoke, of any colour, emitting from the exhaust. If there is it’s an immediate fail.

The other visual check is for any tampering of the particulate filter. Any signs of tampering is also an immediate fail. Following the new tests the Prestige Motor Warehouse carried out a survey amongst 50 MOT stations across the UK and found that in the first 3 months following the rule changes the number of cars failing their MOT testa has increased by 24%.

With other rules either tightened or introduced there was also a 12% increase in petrol engine failures. Other new checks included under-inflated tyres, contaminated brake fluid, and fluid leaks, these being responsible for several of the failures. There is certainly no reason to fail on tyre pressure, a quick visit to a garage before going for the test should sort that out. By Graham Hill

Highways England has produced a report showing that tailgating kills or seriously injures 100 people on the road every year and causes one in eight road casualties. Highways England is the Government-owned company responsible for the UK’s 4,300 miles of motorways and major trunk roads – they produced the statistics from their own research.

They found that 90% of drivers surveyed reported that they had been tailgated or witnessed another driver being tailgated. As a result, they have launched a campaign called ‘Don’t be a space invader’ to help dissuade motorists from the practice. No I don’t get it either. They also found that tailgating was the single largest concern drivers have about other road users.

Ex F1 champion, Nigel Mansell is backing the campaign. He branded tailgating as ‘A driving habit I utterly deplore’, then said that driving too close to the car ahead is, ‘aggressive and intimidating’ and ‘Can lead to a crash with a tragic outcome’. Matthew Avery of Thatcham research agreed and explained, tailgating can lead to a ‘ripple effect’ of sharp braking from other drivers which can cause ‘Phantom’, traffic jams.

Richard Leonard, head of road safety at Highways England, says tailgating is dangerous, not only because it gives the perpetrator no thinking, braking or reacting time. But also it is ‘Intimidating and frightening if you’re on the receiving end’. This mix of circumstances can lead to mistakes being made with serious consequences.

In addition to the possibility of an accident, tailgating can lead to you receiving a fine of £100 and 3 points on your driving licence for dangerous driving. The official advice is to allow 2 seconds between you and the car in front and increase that to 4 seconds in the wet. Drive safely and think of others. By Graham Hill

When I first started driving, a few more years ago than I would care to contemplate, we had a pretty wide choice of power source to drive our cars. We had ummm – petrol or ummm petrol. Trucks had diesel engines but in those days they had to have a diesel pump in the operators depot because you couldn’t buy diesel at a garage.

I think my first experience of a diesel car was when a neighbour had a diesel Peugeot 505 which you could hear turn into our road – a good half mile away. It sounded like a bag of bolts! Of course, things changed but whilst many drivers chose diesel cars because they were economical and with better sound insulation you couldn’t hear the engine in the car it meant we were stuck with a simple choice – diesel or petrol.

Then along came LPG. It was great for chuggers like the Land Rovers that might squeeze 10mpg from their diesel engine with the wind behind them, driving down a one in one hill with all the seats removed. Suddenly driving a Land Rover other than across a ploughed field made sense once you added LPG. But with so much space being taken up by the fuel tank it never really challenged petrol or diesel, especially in a family saloon.

Of course these days, whilst you can still buy LPG at some garages you now have even more sources of fuel to propel you down the road. Petrol, diesel, petrol hybrid, diesel hybrid, plug-in hybrid, electric vehicles and the hydrogen cell that was pretty much wiped out by the introduction of electric.

However, it would seem that hydrogen isn’t dead. Manufacturers are now designing and developing hydrogen/electric hybrids. The first out of the blocks is the Hyundai Nexo which uses the hydrogen cell to drive a motor to create electricity. They suggest that the car will have a range of 414 miles, top speed of 111mph and a 0-62 in 9.2 seconds. Sounds great but the price tag of £60,000 might put a few people off!

It’s a nice looking SUV that is similar in size and looks to an Audi Q5. Would certainly solve the range and re-fuelling constraints of electric cars. Will this idea catch on – adding even more choice to an already confusing range of power plants? Haven’t got a clue just like I haven’t got a clue as to whether we will be in or out of Europe next year! Time will tell. By Graham Hill

The Press Association has carried out an investigation into vehicle thefts and found that between March 2017 and March 2018 theft or unauthorised taking of a motor vehicle in England and Wales was 106,334, the highest since 2009/10. But even more worrying was the fact that 81,778 of these cases were concluded as ‘Investigation complete, no suspect identified’.

This means that 77% of all thefts resulted in no suspects being identified or arrested. That is frankly shocking. In the West Midlands it was even worse with 91% of car theft cases being closed with no suspect being identified. London’s Metropolitan police was a little lower at 85% of cases being closed for the same reasons.

All but 5 of the 44 forces analysed closed at least half of car theft cases with no suspects identified. When taken up with the Home Office a spokesman said, ‘We recognise that crime is changing and police demand is becoming increasingly complex, (no I don’t know what that means either). That’s why we have provided a strong and comprehensive £13 billion funding settlement to ensure the police have the resources they need to carry out their vital work.’

Well I’ve news for you sunshine, they ‘aint spending it on catching bloody car thieves! By Graham Hill

I have to say that when I’m stuck in traffic on the M25, a far too frequent occurrence, I have a little chuckle to myself, as I’m sure you do, (just me then eh?) when I see a number plate that looks a little cheeky or risque. Often I’m sure that I’m the only one who has spotted it but it brightens up my day.

But that may be coming to an end as the DVLA in this politically correct world that we live in has decided that it needs to tighten up a little on plates that may cause offence or upset. For goodness sake! But have they gone a little too far? I mean you really have to look at the plates to see what the letter and number combo have been interpreted as. Let’s give it a try to see what you think?

The first to get banned amongst the new 68 plates was NO68 EAD along with OR68 ASM. Now, most people probably wouldn’t even notice but these miserable BU68 GER’s are destroying hours of motorway fun by trying not to offend most people who wouldn’t even realise.

Apparently, they sift through the number plates every March and September to remove offensive, political and criminal leaning number plates. BU68 GER was banned as were AL68 HOL and BA68 TRD – really? Oh and I can see all sorts of problems if they hadn’t banned EU68 BAD and MU68 GER.

If we really have come down to this sort of silliness (swear words and serious crime connotations accepted) I dread to think of the cost of sifting through the 69 plates next September – nudge, nudge, wink, wink! Better start recruiting plate checker now DVLA! By Graham Hill

These days most of us are of the opinion that new cars, whatever their make, are all pretty reliable. After all, it’s in the manufacturer and dealer’s interest to make sure that you don’t suffer breakdowns in the first 30 days and end up handing the car back for a full refund.

This resulting in the dealer suffering the massive depreciation that happens the moment the tyres hit the road when the car turns from being new to second hand. Beyond the first 30 days with strong warranties and consumer rights one would think that the manufacturers have been doing everything to ensure that the vehicles are fault free. But What Car has found this not to be the case.

Which is disappointing for those buying new cars as opposed to used because often the decision to buy a new car is based on the perceived greater reliability of a new car over a used car. Of course, What Car must justify its spend on these sorts of surveys so one would expect a degree of exaggeration but it doesn’t hide the fact that 30% of their survey respondents, driving cars that were 4 years old or less, said that they had suffered a fault within the last 12 months.

Some cars come with a 3-year warranty whilst others cover up to 7 years but even so only 52% of those with faults had them repaired under warranty. 22% had to pay bills of £101-£200 whilst 6% had bills in excess of £1,500. Their report goes into great detail and covers 159 models over 31 brands.

I have to say that some of the findings were surprising and certainly didn’t agree with the feelings of some of my customers but if you are thinking of buying or leasing a car the report  may be of interest. The October edition of What Car is still available on the newsagent’s shelves.

In answer to the question – which is the most reliable? Up top 4 years old it is Suzuki followed by Lexus. Over 4 years old Lexus followed by Dacia. Bottom of the pile, 20% lower than the next up was Tesla at 57.3% reliability with Land Rover second from bottom at 76.5%. By Graham Hill