Ten million drivers have now done retraining courses

1.2 million drivers attended speed awareness course in 2018

The number of road users who have completed a driver retraining course since their introduction in 2010 has topped ten million. Nine million of these have attended a speed aware course, 1.19 million of them in 2018 alone. Last year 1.45 million people accepted a place on one of the eight courses sometimes offered by police as an alternative to a fine and points for more minor offences. The other courses include:

The national motorway awareness course

What’s driving us?

Your belt – your life (online course)

Almost all the courses are run by private companies and the price of the courses can vary by type, location and provider. In 2017, NDORS (the organisation that administers the scheme) said fees ranged from £75 to £99. Forty-five pounds out of each fee is returned to the police force which referred the offender. Steve Gooding, director of the RAC Foundation, said: “This data suggests that, astonishingly, as many as one in four drivers has now been sent back to the classroom for breaking road traffic law – hopefully to emerge as ambassadors for better, more responsible motoring behaviours. “While the logic of sending drivers who commit minor transgressions back to the classroom is clear, it begs the question of what should be done in a similar vein to tutor those found guilty of more serious breaches of the rules of the roads before they injure or kill themselves or others?”