The combination of yet another holiday season of tragedies followed by an incident in which a girl is struck by a car driven by a young teenager being parented through a driving lesson in a supermarket carpark sends a pretty strong message.
Simply, teach our young people to drive properly - teach them properly, so they can drive properly, and "they" meaning all of them.
Not to draw any conclusions from the incident at Whangamata, nor any other specific recent incidents, it seems a bizarre flaw in our legislative makeup that professional driving training for all teenagers is not mandatory.
We have just endured a seasonal obsession with the road toll, we constantly hear about the social cost of each tragedy, and yet nothing practical is done, other than to fiddle with the structure of the licensing regime.
We now await news of what impact this has had, although it needs little imagination. Some of those who would otherwise have languished in the middle will have reached the other end, but it is highly unlikely there is going to be any great increase in people getting their licences.
