When it comes to driving, there are a couple of things you can guarantee will be making the rounds in the news - firstly, every other week you'll hear about some celebrity getting caught speeding (and more often than not, getting away with it), and secondly, there will be a new addition each month to the age-old debate about which sex is better on the road.
Photo supplied by Bro Bible
Case in point: back in April we heard that Girls Aloud singer Sarah Harding had been arrested for talking on her mobile whilst driving, but, in a shocking turn of events, she actually received some form of punishment; she had to pay a £500 fine and was banned from driving for six months. Admittedly, she still got off rather lightly, but you can't have it all.
And as for the battle of the sexes, we recently heard of a study conducted by Carrentals UK, which indicated that women tend to make the better drivers, as a higher percentage of men had been involved in accidents.
Well, now we have yet another survey adding fuel to the fire. This new study, conducted by the Australian car buying service Private Fleet, is the most comprehensive of its kind ever recorded Down Under, and gives a new perspective on drivers - both male and female - and their habits.
With more than 3500 drivers taking part in the study, some of the answers are surprising. Here are some of the more interesting results of the survey; where do you fit in? (Oh, and to keep you reading on, I'm going to hold back the male vs. female question until the end... enjoy!)
Most drivers seem to be doing a good job of things, as a massive 65% of all those surveyed said that they had been involved in precisely zero accidents within the previous three years. Worryingly, however, there seems to be the odd maniac out on the roads - 0.1% of the drivers admitted to having been in thirteen or more!
Maybe they are simply unfortunate, like this poor lady.
97% of people reported being in zero serious accidents (read: police were called) over that period of time, but two people had been in seven or more!
Apparently, it was always someone else's fault - 83% of those involved in one or more accidents claimed that they weren't at fault in any of them, and this only rose when the accidents were serious: only 1.3% of people admitted that they were to blame! Somehow, 98.7% of people were completely innocent...
Sarah Harding has a fair amount of company it would seem, as more than a third of drivers admitted to using their phone whilst driving, and that's not with a hands-free device! Maybe some of us should go back to driving school...
Sending a text message is apparently fair game, as more than a quarter of those asked owned up to having done so while behind the wheel. We can only hope that they weren't quite as brazen as this guy.
It seems as though road rage is common - just 15% said they never get angry while driving. We can only thank the Lord that the Incredible Hulk isn't real.
And lastly, sorry ladies, but the Private Fleet survey revealed that men are the better drivers! By extrapolating the results, it was found that female drivers are involved in an accident roughly every 76,000 miles, whereas men only got into scrapes every 108,000. This means that women are roughly 40% more likely to get banged up, when you look at it on a miles-driven basis.
If you are doubtful of these results, remember it is a survey so human error (read: lies) can come into play, but the pure, unadulterated statistics can be found here for your perusal.
Just remember, this doesn't mean all females are poor at driving, nor does it mean that all males are good at it. However, one woman hit the headlines recently for being particularly awful at parallel parking. Click here to watch it for yourself, and be thankful it's not you in that video!