I must apologise to my regular readers. A few weeks ago I stated that most drivers had been brainwashed into thinking that if they exceeded the speed limit they are dangerous maniacs so should be punished.

In that deliberately controversial opinion piece I suggested that if hundreds of drivers were booked by the same hidden speed camera within a few hours, then perhaps the speed limit was too low, rather than all the drivers were stupid.

Hundreds of thousands of you have read that piece by now, yet only one has disagreed with me to my face. To the other 99.9999 per cent, my sincere apologies for suggesting that you aren’t capable of thinking for yourself.

The one who disagreed, a lady from WA, was somewhat vitriolic in her correspondence; “high octane fantasies … bizarre opinions … idiosyncratic ravings” were just some of her words.

She took the usual points of view of the ‘speed-kills’ lobby. That speed limits have been carefully calculated by experts so must be correct. My view is that all thinking drivers are aware that the safe speed varies from moment to moment; according to time of day, weather conditions, road surface, vehicle type, visibility, traffic density, the presence of pedestrians and/or cyclists, even their own state of mind, and therefore they make judgements accordingly. Something experienced drivers do with ease while barely being aware of the complex calculations happening within their brains.

There are plenty of times when travelling at the speed limit means you are going too fast. Those who say the-law-is-the-law and must be obeyed may well be the same people who drive at the speed limit all the time because they blindly obey every regulation governments throw at them.

Then the lady brought up the old argument that the slower you are going when you crash the better off you, and others involved, will be. To which I reply that the primary objective of safe driving is not to have a crash at the slowest possible speed, but to avoid it in the first place.

In my opinion a driver travelling at the appropriate speed for the conditions is likely to be more alert and aware than one who is sitting at an unnaturally low or high speed for the circumstances.

Let's get down to basics by wandering off at a tangent for a moment. Some say it’s blindingly obvious that driving fast causes crashes. But a few centuries ago it was ‘blindingly obvious’ that the Earth was at the centre of the universe and the sun circled it. People were tortured and/or killed by the authorities if they dared to disagree with their pronouncements.

I’m not sure I would have had the guts to contradict authorities back then… Thank goodness I live in Australia in the 21st century and enjoy the freedom afforded by my adopted country. The same freedom that permits the lady from WA to criticise me and put her points of view.

I am positive that car crashes are caused by a complex series of events and to single out just one reason – exceeding the speed limit – as a major focus for road-safety campaigns can be dangerously counterproductive.

Witness the fatality rate in Western Australia, the lady’s home state. A heavy concentration by the authorities on making drivers slow down has apparently done just that. Yet road deaths in the 12 months to the end of October 2007 in WA were 228 compared to 191 in the same period last year. And the overall reduction in fatalities over the last 25 years is worse in WA than anywhere else in Australia.

On another tangent, I noticed something else while checking the latest crash statistics: the introduction of a speed limit in the Northern Territory from January 1st this year has coincided with an increase of road deaths in the Territory. I am certainly not saying the two are closely linked, after all I have just pointed out that crashes are the result of complex circumstances.

Previously there was no set speed limit on the open road in the NT, instead drivers were told to drive according to conditions. Is it any wonder that I harp on about allowing drivers, not faceless bureaucrats, decide how a vehicle should be handled from moment to moment?

May I finish this somewhat rambling opinion piece by giving yet again my mantra on safe driving: Always have two hands on the steering wheel, two eyes on the road and 100 per cent of your mind on the vital task you are undertaking.