EU plans 11 new safety measures for all new cars after 2021

You may have heard some claptrap Daily Mail horror stories about new EU speed limiters. Well it's not true.

It's just adaptive cruise control connected with GPS that can be switched off.

More important other bits are emergency braking, lane keep assist and fatigue monitoring by 2021.

Automatic emergency braking will be life safer against old ladies T-boning your bike prince Phil style

https://www.carbuyer.co.uk/news/163660/autonomous-emergency-braking-to-become-standard-on-all-new-cars

They always said it can be turned off, it will however go against you in the event of an accident if it's speed related.

Basically they want the driver to become a passenger ... Fook the EU .

Well the folk looking after the speed limit signs will have to do more. Recently went from a 50 to a 40 zone. I could just about make out the sign obscured by the hedge, but the camera in the car missed it. Dash indicator was still saying 50!

I think the point is that there will be technology in the vehicle to prevent accidentally exceeding the speed limit......which can be easily overridden.....which I think is no bad thing........how it's implemented is another thing though......my car's satnav would be happy with me doing 70mph in the 40mph roadworks all around where we live at the moment.....whereas Waze is more up to date and accurately indicates the temporary speed limits in place.

But it all comes down to, if you don't want to get done for speeding, then don't speed.....don't go bleating if you deliberately break the speed limit and get caught.....simples.....

Well.. one of the downsides of "taking back control" is that we will lose all influence and have to take whatever the EU decides. if they decide to mandate various safety systems and a majority of the various governments say YES then we will also have them too as any cars imported to the UK will come to us from EU Factories, Factories that used to be here.

Well.. one of the downsides of "taking back control" is that we will lose all influence and have to take whatever the EU decides. if they decide to mandate various safety systems and a majority of the various governments say YES then we will also have them too as any cars imported to the UK will come to us from EU Factories, Factories that used to be here.

In my industry at least, 'taking back control' has already turned with entirely predictable inevitability into 'taking it up the arse'.

The industry in which I work is governed entirely by a piece of EU-wide legislation (that incidentally the UK played a very significant part in writing) that has harmonised safety standards and levelled the playing field across 28 member states, making the food we eat safer for everyone. Of those 28 member states the UK had one of the strongest voices and amongst the greatest influence; now we have neither, and having absented ourselves from the table we are having to abide by whatever the rest of Europe decides. The impact is already being felt by our national regulatory agency, who despite their huge expertise is seeing nobody bringing their products to them for evaluation. What a victory.

The legislation didn't stop us getting horse meat and unidentifiable meat being sent from Ireland and passed off as proper meat, didn't stop animals in Europe passed as unfit to enter food chain going into food production.

I'm sure it's a pain but regardless of in or out crooks don't give a shit.

The legislation didn't stop us getting horse meat and unidentifiable meat being sent from Ireland and passed off as proper meat, didn't stop animals in Europe passed as unfit to enter food chain going into food production.

I'm sure it's a pain but regardless of in or out crooks don't give a shit.

That's not what I mean: I work in the pesticide industry, where the regulatory procedures for any new active substance require the input of all 28 Member States and various other EU agencies. The UK used to be seen as one of the leading Member States for its regulatory expertise, and we had a huge influence over what happened at EU level. Now we have none, and because the UK has neither the desire nor the resources to invent a new pesticide regulatory process we will be following what the EU does, just with zero influence.

A thread that started about cars is now onto horsemeat.

Why am I not surprised by this?

Im sure i spotted a bit of dirt on the Africa twin this morning.. this seems a good time to get busy. bucket and sponge.

The legislation didn't stop us getting horse meat and unidentifiable meat being sent from Ireland and passed off as proper meat, didn't stop animals in Europe passed as unfit to enter food chain going into food production.

I'm sure it's a pain but regardless of in or out crooks don't give a shit.

Didn’t stop British farmers feeding unfit meat to British people - the BSE debacle should serve as a warning that British regulations under a Tory Government are only there to promote more profit for the already rich !!

I wouldn't bother reading this - I'm just trying to look busy to avoid having to hoover out the car:

Before the early 1990s every country in Europe had its own approach to pesticide regulation: some countries had no regulation at all, meaning farmers could spray what they liked on whatever they liked as often as they liked and at whatever concentration took their fancy. Other countries allowed certain pesticides to be used but not others, or set Maximum Residue Levels on crops differently to other countries, both of which made importing and exporting treated produce a nightmare; growers in Spain could produce their fruit and veg using cheap pesticides that were banned in the UK, and their stuff would then sit alongside UK produce in the supermarket at a fraction of the price.

Then the EU decided to harmonise things across the whole of Europe, and now everyone has to play by the same rules and follow the same evaluation process. Not only that, but the EU set up a rolling review programme of every pesticide on the market, meaning that many of the worst were banned. The introduction of bystander and resident exposure modelling as part of the approval process means the likelihood of little Johnny getting a face-full of something nasty when the farmer sprays the field next to his school is now pretty much nil, unlike when I was a boy and we used to dare each other to stand at the edge of the playing field as the tractor went past and a cloud of overspray came blasting through the hedge. Other EU legislation, such as the Water Framework Directive, has enhanced the protection of drinking water from pesticide residues. The regulatory system is far from perfect - anyone involved from the bottom to the top will tell you that - but it's light years ahead of where we were less than 30 years ago, and has been used as a model by many other non-EU countries.

The UK played one of the most significant roles in drafting EU pesticide legislation (I used to work with the man who helped to write it) and has always had one of the most powerful voices at the table. And unlike what lazy liars like Farage will tell you, this is the case for most if not all the legislation we operate under. There are still people, even now, who genuinely believe that Belgians come up with this stuff in secret and then impose it on us against our will.

In an effort to 'take back control' that in reality we always had, we have now lost it completely: we will still have to abide by EU pesticide legislation, just as we have for years, but we will have absolutely no say in the decision making process, no vote on which pesticides are approved or not, no influence whatsoever in any part of the process.

Anyway, I have managed to look busy long enough for my wife to have given up on the idea that I'm going to hoover the car today. Result!