The race towards successful autonomous – or driverless – cars continues at high speed. However, the insurance industry has raised concerns that the UK is woefully under-prepared for their arrival. Insurance professionals are calling for the urgent overhauling of the laws dealing with insurance in order to review the issue of autonomous cars, which are expected to be on UK roads by 2021.
Liability issues
Questions around liability have already been one of the stumbling blocks for the roll-out of driverless cars, especially during the period where they won’t be entirely driverless. The driver will be legally in charge – even when the vehicle is using autopilot. Insurers are concerned that this could lead to confusion over responsibility and could mean drivers face uninsured losses.
Chris Grayling, Secretary of State for Transport, said that the government would rule that future policies must cover injuries to all parties where driverless vehicles are involved. In a speech to insurers, he went on to say that self-driving cars would be in use by 2021 and that a new compulsory insurance framework would be required to cover these vehicles, including the issue of drivers having legal control.
In addition, the Thatcham Research Centre, a motoring body funded by the insurance industry, has urged the government to speed up the reforms currently covered under the Automated and Electric Vehicles bill. The research organisation believes that, while self-driving cars will eventually cut road accidents, the current situation with semi-autonomous vehicles will confuse people.
(Credit – Flickr User)
On the road
The Audi A8 was launched in June. It has an autopilot mode in which the car can navigate through slow-moving traffic, in addition to being able to park itself. However, the legal and insurance implications of this have yet to be confirmed. Drivers in the front seat have their hands on the wheel during these manoeuvres, but the insurance industry has raised concerns about when the driver takes back full control.
The A8 is due to be on the road next year. It has reached a level of autonomy classed by engineers as level 3. This means the car does most of the tasks, though the driver is required to intervene at certain points. According to the Association of British Insurers, many people wrongly think the vehicle can manage the whole journey, which isn’t the case.
Autonomous checklist
Thatcham has drawn up a ten-point checklist of features that it believes manufacturers of autonomous cars should follow. These include transparent signalling of independent capabilities and systems to ensure that handover back to the driver is clear to understand. It would certainly help deal with potential grey areas where a driver would not be insured for their injuries when a car was driving autonomously, although passengers would.
Currently, the levels of automation recognised in the industry include:
Level 0 – no automation
Level 1 – driver assistant
Level 2 – partial automation
Level 3 – conditional automation
Level 4 – high automation
Level 5 – full automation
Level 3 upwards involves the automated driving system monitoring the driving environment to make decisions about driving.
Driverless in the US
Testing of driverless cars in the US is well ahead of what the UK has experienced. Both the national and state governments seem keen to continue advancing the tests. Driverless cars have hit several milestones already, including the first without a backup driver in Arizona. Google’s parent company Alphabet has also announced a fleet of modified Chrysler Pacifica minivans, which will undergo testing on the roads of Phoenix.
The US authorities are already looking at solutions for problems we have yet to consider here in the UK. For example, how do we handle driverless cars on the motorway? And how will they interact with smart motorways? In the US, the authorities are considering having driverless car lanes on some interstates. But how will the vehicles handle traffic jams or roadworks? While the growth of the driverless cars continues, there are still many questions to be answered and the UK needs to push ahead urgently in order to be ready for the arrival of this technology.
Why is the UK lagging behind in its approach to driverless car adoption? How can we do more to ensure we’re fully prepared for the motoring technology of the future? Leave a comment to share your views.
Driverless cars ……hang on….they could not negotiate our potholes!
Why should anyone have them? To control the population! People in this country enjoy driving, except in heavy traffic! You may as well use public transportation!
Eventually driverless vehicles will be the public transport. Owner-driven cars will be in a similar minority to private aircraft now. As you are reading this over 95% of all cars are parked and empty, many causing congestion for the less than 5% that are moving, or trying to move. It will take some years but driverless is where the world is going, like it or not. Britain can just get left behind. One of the reasons is that we no longer own and direct the policy of vehicle mass producers. Only the public sector can keep us in the technology race.
.
re: James once vehicles become driverless, TAAS or transport a a service will become the norm. People will not own cars. They will request a journey on their smartphone/PC. Think Uber for private cars. The most significant part of TAAS will be journey sharing. This will reduce congestion, and will be the big game changer. No more empty busses spewing out diesel, fewer traffic jams. Less city space wasted for parking. Fewer cars built, as car utilization per head improves. Less pollution per head. So many benefits.
I just hope that I’m dead by then.
Perhaps we don’t want them. I love driving, why should we be forced to give up using a valuable skill – do they just want us all to turn into brainless zombies?
What about the impact on the economy? No more taxi drivers, fewer driving instructors, no more bus drivers.
Driverless cars will get you nowhere in town, if the technology to detect pedestrians works properly everyone is just going to step out in front of them and cross the road, biggest traffic snarl up ever!
Driverless Cars/ Hs2. WHY ???????
What a pointless invention driverless cars are if you don’t want to drive save thousands and get a taxi/bus/train/or personal driver. Why buy such a pointless bauble that you will lose thousands on when you come to sell it on?
Why!! What’s the point I don’t get it!! Why do we feel the need to sit in a box with wheels and let it drive us. I’m sorry but I just think it’s a waste of time. We have enough trouble with cars with idiots driving them, can you imagine the carnage when idiot meets a car with no driver. Gimmicky load of tosh. The money the government is investing in this Rubbish would be better spent paying our nurses and emergency staff a decent wage. Whom I think will be called on a lot more if driverless cars are the norm.
Perhaps a driverless estate might be useful if you could drop the back seat and get your head down and wait for the call announcing arrival at your destination!
All computers can be hacked – ‘if it can be built, it can be hacked!’ Just one of these driverless weapons can be used with lethal effect on a busy motorway. Why would anyone trust their lives and of the others around them to a piece of computer guided metalwork? And what’s the point of making the driver responsible? He/she just wants to sit in the back seat reading their newspaper, or what is the point of having the thing? Humans can make that split-second decision to swerve out of the way completely – and not to swerve INTO the pavement where a young mother and twins are innocently walking along…
Hang on! If driverless cars ARE so perfect….then why do we need to insure them? I can feel the government and insurance industry twitching right now! Either they are perfect …or they aren’t. No computer programme is absolutely perfect in this sort of situation. Will it eventually come to ‘I saw you driving for yourself Sir/Madam, didn’t you know that is against the law?’
How will these driverless cars navigate by using a sat nav? Look at all the confusion over them where people have driven off road because the sat nav told them to. How will they handle new roads or alterations to roads? What happens if a road is closed and you need to take a diversion?
There have been many films involving driverless cars the most memorable being the 2004 classic I ROBOT where the driverless car is hacked and kills the driver and almost kills Will Smith.
What is stopping terrosists using this technology to do their dirty work? We have already seen them use vehicles to kill. All they would have to do is turn the sensors off or give them false readings and set them off into a crowd. You can’t shoot the driver if there is none?
What would happen if the technology was to fail and your driving on the motorway? Your going 70 and the car dies and stops in fast lane or it doesn’t see the car in front has stopped?
The first application for these cars would be as a taxi. I can’t see taxi drivers taking this lightly, but I can see firms like UBA do this as it would solve their problems of having to employ drivers instead of being self employed.
Your = you’re. UBA = Uber.
The only good thing about driverless cars is if we’re all got driverless cars you won’t need traffic police and you need to train officers in high speed driving techniques. Can you still be done for drink driving if the car is in control and how would the police be able to tell if it was you driving or the car?
It occurs to me that the little car illustrated looks just like a car drawn by a three-year-old! Would YOU be seen getting out of one? And what about the Queen or the PM? If Theresa gets a Jag, I want one too!
1984 is about to arrive where the government will monitor your entire day track your movement by logging your mobile phone signal.
A number of aircraft accidents have occurred over the years when the autopilot can no longer cope and hands it back to the man in the hot seat. . I enjoy driving where I want when I want, this is another way to get us on public transport. In Birmingham they are currently suffering massive congestion due to a new tram route being created,
Why would I get in a box over which I have no control, they are a disaster waiting top happen
Can’t understand why we’re putting so much money into something that is so short-sighted, when one of the biggest problems is congestion, why add more cars to it, driverless or otherwise? Adding more, because there will be no grounds to disqualify many of those currently excluded from driving for medical or other reasons. I don’t like driving, but I do enjoy the convenience of it, so I’m all for an automated, integrated personal transport system, but it needs to be above ground level so that can travel directly to our destination, and are not herded together like sheep to negotiate topographical barriers such as rivers and railways, using some sort of satellite controlled gridded network at differing heights for different journey lengths. Regardless of ‘smart’ motorways, putting more cars on the existing roads is utterly pointless.
Just a thought if vehicles are driver less then as already stated they can be used by drunk drivers / people who have not taken a test / poor sighted / disqualified / children . what happens when driving on country roads especially single carriageway with passing places , who will decide to stop or reverse , when meeting vehicles towing what happens then & if both are towing caravans we shall have roads being used as caravan sites as easier to stop where you are !!!!. Who will insurance companies believe or know who or what caused the accident because I was sorting out what I will do when I arrive at work ” sir “. What is the point of driver less vehicles anyway because if driving is not your thing then use alternative types of transport . Government spending millions on this when someone sometime will have to spend millions repairing highways / signage / etc so it would be more sensible to get what we have got that is falling to bits put right first The cost of putting electrical sensing into road surfacing to help control all vehicles moving on motorways etc . Who will be happy driving on motorways @ 70 + with no one taking notice of there surroundings , NOT ME , do not trust some goons out there who stay in one lane for miles & not move over when lane 3 is empty & you have indicated to pull out to overtake ,If you could be read some paperwork instead of looking ahead then undertakers is the trade to be in when this is the norm .This world is going crazier every day , glad to be an old wrinkly soon to hang up my keys before I get flattened by a runaway driver less vehicle
I’m well against electric cars where has the fun gone from having a car when I was 18 years old I enjoyed going out for a drive not now once electric cars come on the road there will be many accidents on the road what about clocks going back kids coming out of school doesn’t bear thinking about thank god I’ll be 90 when they are on the roads good luck because I will never own self drive electric car
What a whinge fest. Terrorist, 1984, population control, central AI control – please lay off the whiskey Mike. Yes, this is a game-changer, and there is lots to sort out in regard to legal, insurance, special road situations, safety and security, and that’s precisely why we need to get started, because it’s coming. The cars are autonomous. That is, they mainly rely on their own sensors to navigate and make decisions. Currently they do not get any instructions from central computers but would need the ability to give it a destination remotely for TAAS. They can be assisted by GPS and similar technologies, but are not controlled by them. Hacking, remote control and weaponising should be considered seriously, as I’m sure it is not least by the manufacturers who want to avoid liability.
This will not necessarily reduce the number of journeys. In fact, it’s more likely to increase the number due to not having the strain of driving. However, autonomous cars will drive in a more civil way that will cause less congestion. They can even reduce their speed since trimming a few minutes of the journey time is irrelevant when you can use you time otherwise under way – reading, working, snoozing, etc. – when the technology becomes mature enough.
What is the point of driverless cars? I just don’t get it!
If we are not driving the car why should we have to insure it it should be insured by the people who in charge ???
This whole technology is unbelievably stupid. Why are people involving themselves in technology that will come to nothing when there are many problems on this planet that actually need the attention of these apparently clever people.
The USA is leading the way on this because Americans generally don’t “get” driving. Look at the proportion of cars sold there with automatic transmission compared to most other countries, for instance. Their speed limits tend to be stricter because a high proportion of Americans don’t really possess that much driving skill. If you ever watch the likes of “Police, Camera, Action” by far the majority of incidents where someone gets mowed down at the side of the road occur on American clips, where the driver wasn’t paying attention. To Americans, driving is a commodity offered to everyone at 16 years of age.
Thanks to this and the willingness of the likes of the UK to follow everything America does, autonomous cars are being pushed onto us, using our money to subsidise American-led private industry.
Driverless Cars, it is very difficult to know is what the actual position is with driverless cars, some commentators saying they are just around the corner 2021 and others saying they are years off and when they do arrive they will be so expensive that they will be rented or hired from Uber etc. A driverless car is a driverless car no ifs no buts. Talk of Autonomousness is muddying the waters unless its level 5. Why do people think that the Audi A8 can manage the whole journey automatically is it been promoted as “driverless”?
There are obvious attractions to driverless cars, people that can no longer meet the health requirements to drive or do not feel confidant to do so, or some may wish a night out that involves a drink, etc. If these cars were available at the same price or at a small premium then there would be a take up.
As regards anything less than driverless ie level 3, what is the point you would still need someone who is fully capable to drive in the car. I would find it more stressful if I had to remain fully alert monitoring all the time in case I needed to take over.
One of the main obstacles appears to be attempting to get on to an island or out of a side road in heavy traffic, in practise this often involves eye contact between drivers, also how does it recognise a person in authority (Policeman etc) giving hand commands. It’s said that safety is paramount which has led to suggestions that the car will just come to a stop permanently at a junction in heavy traffic, so is this when the driver has to take over to expedite matters? hardly a low stress time with horns blearing. It has been alarmingly said that a criminal could just stand in front of the car which would have to stop while accomplices could break into the car and rob the occupants.
It would be nice to know what the true position and timeline was for driverless cars was, I am sure that this will come eventually. We await further news, but unless these driverless cars are a reasonable price they will not take off. There will always be few that will pay through the nose for the bragging rights of new technology but if they are expensive only the likes of Uber will buy them and only then if they are a cheaper option than drivers.
So, just who is it that’s pushing driverless cars, the Googles of this world (give us more of your money), Governments (you WILL do as we say), or us the general public (leave me alone and let me enjoy life).
Driverless cars ……hang on….they could not negotiate our potholes!
Why should anyone have them? To control the population! People in this country enjoy driving, except in heavy traffic! You may as well use public transportation!
Eventually driverless vehicles will be the public transport. Owner-driven cars will be in a similar minority to private aircraft now. As you are reading this over 95% of all cars are parked and empty, many causing congestion for the less than 5% that are moving, or trying to move. It will take some years but driverless is where the world is going, like it or not. Britain can just get left behind. One of the reasons is that we no longer own and direct the policy of vehicle mass producers. Only the public sector can keep us in the technology race.
.
re: James once vehicles become driverless, TAAS or transport a a service will become the norm. People will not own cars. They will request a journey on their smartphone/PC. Think Uber for private cars. The most significant part of TAAS will be journey sharing. This will reduce congestion, and will be the big game changer. No more empty busses spewing out diesel, fewer traffic jams. Less city space wasted for parking. Fewer cars built, as car utilization per head improves. Less pollution per head. So many benefits.
I just hope that I’m dead by then.
Perhaps we don’t want them. I love driving, why should we be forced to give up using a valuable skill – do they just want us all to turn into brainless zombies?
What about the impact on the economy? No more taxi drivers, fewer driving instructors, no more bus drivers.
Driverless cars will get you nowhere in town, if the technology to detect pedestrians works properly everyone is just going to step out in front of them and cross the road, biggest traffic snarl up ever!
Driverless Cars/ Hs2. WHY ???????
What a pointless invention driverless cars are if you don’t want to drive save thousands and get a taxi/bus/train/or personal driver. Why buy such a pointless bauble that you will lose thousands on when you come to sell it on?
Why!! What’s the point I don’t get it!! Why do we feel the need to sit in a box with wheels and let it drive us. I’m sorry but I just think it’s a waste of time. We have enough trouble with cars with idiots driving them, can you imagine the carnage when idiot meets a car with no driver. Gimmicky load of tosh. The money the government is investing in this Rubbish would be better spent paying our nurses and emergency staff a decent wage. Whom I think will be called on a lot more if driverless cars are the norm.
Perhaps a driverless estate might be useful if you could drop the back seat and get your head down and wait for the call announcing arrival at your destination!
All computers can be hacked – ‘if it can be built, it can be hacked!’ Just one of these driverless weapons can be used with lethal effect on a busy motorway. Why would anyone trust their lives and of the others around them to a piece of computer guided metalwork? And what’s the point of making the driver responsible? He/she just wants to sit in the back seat reading their newspaper, or what is the point of having the thing? Humans can make that split-second decision to swerve out of the way completely – and not to swerve INTO the pavement where a young mother and twins are innocently walking along…
Hang on! If driverless cars ARE so perfect….then why do we need to insure them? I can feel the government and insurance industry twitching right now! Either they are perfect …or they aren’t. No computer programme is absolutely perfect in this sort of situation. Will it eventually come to ‘I saw you driving for yourself Sir/Madam, didn’t you know that is against the law?’
How will these driverless cars navigate by using a sat nav? Look at all the confusion over them where people have driven off road because the sat nav told them to. How will they handle new roads or alterations to roads? What happens if a road is closed and you need to take a diversion?
There have been many films involving driverless cars the most memorable being the 2004 classic I ROBOT where the driverless car is hacked and kills the driver and almost kills Will Smith.
What is stopping terrosists using this technology to do their dirty work? We have already seen them use vehicles to kill. All they would have to do is turn the sensors off or give them false readings and set them off into a crowd. You can’t shoot the driver if there is none?
What would happen if the technology was to fail and your driving on the motorway? Your going 70 and the car dies and stops in fast lane or it doesn’t see the car in front has stopped?
The first application for these cars would be as a taxi. I can’t see taxi drivers taking this lightly, but I can see firms like UBA do this as it would solve their problems of having to employ drivers instead of being self employed.
Your = you’re. UBA = Uber.
The only good thing about driverless cars is if we’re all got driverless cars you won’t need traffic police and you need to train officers in high speed driving techniques. Can you still be done for drink driving if the car is in control and how would the police be able to tell if it was you driving or the car?
It occurs to me that the little car illustrated looks just like a car drawn by a three-year-old! Would YOU be seen getting out of one? And what about the Queen or the PM? If Theresa gets a Jag, I want one too!
1984 is about to arrive where the government will monitor your entire day track your movement by logging your mobile phone signal.
A number of aircraft accidents have occurred over the years when the autopilot can no longer cope and hands it back to the man in the hot seat. . I enjoy driving where I want when I want, this is another way to get us on public transport. In Birmingham they are currently suffering massive congestion due to a new tram route being created,
Why would I get in a box over which I have no control, they are a disaster waiting top happen
Can’t understand why we’re putting so much money into something that is so short-sighted, when one of the biggest problems is congestion, why add more cars to it, driverless or otherwise? Adding more, because there will be no grounds to disqualify many of those currently excluded from driving for medical or other reasons. I don’t like driving, but I do enjoy the convenience of it, so I’m all for an automated, integrated personal transport system, but it needs to be above ground level so that can travel directly to our destination, and are not herded together like sheep to negotiate topographical barriers such as rivers and railways, using some sort of satellite controlled gridded network at differing heights for different journey lengths. Regardless of ‘smart’ motorways, putting more cars on the existing roads is utterly pointless.
Just a thought if vehicles are driver less then as already stated they can be used by drunk drivers / people who have not taken a test / poor sighted / disqualified / children . what happens when driving on country roads especially single carriageway with passing places , who will decide to stop or reverse , when meeting vehicles towing what happens then & if both are towing caravans we shall have roads being used as caravan sites as easier to stop where you are !!!!. Who will insurance companies believe or know who or what caused the accident because I was sorting out what I will do when I arrive at work ” sir “. What is the point of driver less vehicles anyway because if driving is not your thing then use alternative types of transport . Government spending millions on this when someone sometime will have to spend millions repairing highways / signage / etc so it would be more sensible to get what we have got that is falling to bits put right first The cost of putting electrical sensing into road surfacing to help control all vehicles moving on motorways etc . Who will be happy driving on motorways @ 70 + with no one taking notice of there surroundings , NOT ME , do not trust some goons out there who stay in one lane for miles & not move over when lane 3 is empty & you have indicated to pull out to overtake ,If you could be read some paperwork instead of looking ahead then undertakers is the trade to be in when this is the norm .This world is going crazier every day , glad to be an old wrinkly soon to hang up my keys before I get flattened by a runaway driver less vehicle
I’m well against electric cars where has the fun gone from having a car when I was 18 years old I enjoyed going out for a drive not now once electric cars come on the road there will be many accidents on the road what about clocks going back kids coming out of school doesn’t bear thinking about thank god I’ll be 90 when they are on the roads good luck because I will never own self drive electric car
What a whinge fest. Terrorist, 1984, population control, central AI control – please lay off the whiskey Mike. Yes, this is a game-changer, and there is lots to sort out in regard to legal, insurance, special road situations, safety and security, and that’s precisely why we need to get started, because it’s coming. The cars are autonomous. That is, they mainly rely on their own sensors to navigate and make decisions. Currently they do not get any instructions from central computers but would need the ability to give it a destination remotely for TAAS. They can be assisted by GPS and similar technologies, but are not controlled by them. Hacking, remote control and weaponising should be considered seriously, as I’m sure it is not least by the manufacturers who want to avoid liability.
This will not necessarily reduce the number of journeys. In fact, it’s more likely to increase the number due to not having the strain of driving. However, autonomous cars will drive in a more civil way that will cause less congestion. They can even reduce their speed since trimming a few minutes of the journey time is irrelevant when you can use you time otherwise under way – reading, working, snoozing, etc. – when the technology becomes mature enough.
What is the point of driverless cars? I just don’t get it!
If we are not driving the car why should we have to insure it it should be insured by the people who in charge ???
This whole technology is unbelievably stupid. Why are people involving themselves in technology that will come to nothing when there are many problems on this planet that actually need the attention of these apparently clever people.
The USA is leading the way on this because Americans generally don’t “get” driving. Look at the proportion of cars sold there with automatic transmission compared to most other countries, for instance. Their speed limits tend to be stricter because a high proportion of Americans don’t really possess that much driving skill. If you ever watch the likes of “Police, Camera, Action” by far the majority of incidents where someone gets mowed down at the side of the road occur on American clips, where the driver wasn’t paying attention. To Americans, driving is a commodity offered to everyone at 16 years of age.
Thanks to this and the willingness of the likes of the UK to follow everything America does, autonomous cars are being pushed onto us, using our money to subsidise American-led private industry.
Driverless Cars, it is very difficult to know is what the actual position is with driverless cars, some commentators saying they are just around the corner 2021 and others saying they are years off and when they do arrive they will be so expensive that they will be rented or hired from Uber etc. A driverless car is a driverless car no ifs no buts. Talk of Autonomousness is muddying the waters unless its level 5. Why do people think that the Audi A8 can manage the whole journey automatically is it been promoted as “driverless”?
There are obvious attractions to driverless cars, people that can no longer meet the health requirements to drive or do not feel confidant to do so, or some may wish a night out that involves a drink, etc. If these cars were available at the same price or at a small premium then there would be a take up.
As regards anything less than driverless ie level 3, what is the point you would still need someone who is fully capable to drive in the car. I would find it more stressful if I had to remain fully alert monitoring all the time in case I needed to take over.
One of the main obstacles appears to be attempting to get on to an island or out of a side road in heavy traffic, in practise this often involves eye contact between drivers, also how does it recognise a person in authority (Policeman etc) giving hand commands. It’s said that safety is paramount which has led to suggestions that the car will just come to a stop permanently at a junction in heavy traffic, so is this when the driver has to take over to expedite matters? hardly a low stress time with horns blearing. It has been alarmingly said that a criminal could just stand in front of the car which would have to stop while accomplices could break into the car and rob the occupants.
It would be nice to know what the true position and timeline was for driverless cars was, I am sure that this will come eventually. We await further news, but unless these driverless cars are a reasonable price they will not take off. There will always be few that will pay through the nose for the bragging rights of new technology but if they are expensive only the likes of Uber will buy them and only then if they are a cheaper option than drivers.
So, just who is it that’s pushing driverless cars, the Googles of this world (give us more of your money), Governments (you WILL do as we say), or us the general public (leave me alone and let me enjoy life).