Editorial: Off the phone, off the accelerator

Opinion

Forgive us for traipsing, wide-eyed and childlike, through pastoral idylls - but when did life become so fast-paced that we decided we needed to drive at 100km/h down the highway while shouting into our cellphones?

If today's new mobile phone ban does nothing else, it might at least remind us to slow down just a little. To take the foot off the accelerator of life.

It really wasn't so long ago that an evening out meant meeting up with one set of friends, at one agreed home, pub or restaurant.

Now, we juggle half a dozen different appointments in different places, using our cellphones to schedule, reschedule and liaise.

Instead of planning a work meeting, drafting an agenda and making a firm decision, we dither back and forth with emails and text messages.

This is not to advocate a return to an Amish lifestyle of horse carts, quilting and inbreeding. Needlework at the reins is probably just as risky as texting at the wheel.

But rather than buying over-priced hands-free kits, why not follow the lead of national road policing manager Superintendent Paula Rose? She doesn't use a hands-free kit. She doesn't switch her phone off while leaving it sitting seductively on the passenger seat.

She throws it in the boot.

Like one of those blissful long weekends at a beach without network coverage, that could provide a few precious moments of sanctuary from life's bustle.

And avoid an $80 fine.

- HERALD ON SUNDAY