I REFER to the article ‘Our elderly are wheel keen to keep driving’ (Echo, February 17).

On a visit to Sainsbury’s car park in Poole this week, I was amazed that several of my fellow ‘old duffers’ could hardly stand upright at the ticket machine, let alone drive a car.

It’s a fact that none of us older drivers want to lose our licences, and its an economic fact that retirees (known as the lump sum generation) are more likely to afford a new car.

But on reaching 70 I think that our driving should be assessed.

General health and eyesight should be checked before we are issued with a new licence.

We are fed many statistics regarding who is safe or unsafe on our roads.

We know that inexperience can sometimes be fatal. The aggressive driving from the minority of young (usually) males caused accidents. Women are safer drivers than men.

We know that 25,000 people over the age of 80 are still driving on Dorset roads.

I am sure that the vast majority of these elderly folk are safe drivers, but, and I speak as a 71-year-old man, we all know with age reaction time is longer, our reflexes and thinking time is slower.

It is no good saying “that I only drive to the supermarket once a week”.

A licence holder should be capable of driving in all weathers, at night, on motorways, be able to react safely and keep up with the traffic.

In the past I have had driving jobs with both Dorset and Bournemouth councils. We were given regular driving training and driving assessments by well qualified and impartial driving examiners.

Most of us “professional” drivers had our faults pointed out, this was accepted as a positive and worthwhile course, because it made us safer drivers.

Many older drivers have had no test or driving assessment since passing their test, perhaps in the 1950s or 1960s.

The modern driving test is far more difficult in both theory and practice than years ago.

If any of our elderly have to give up their car just do the costings.

Tax, insurance, depreciation, fuel, repairs and servicing, etc, would not compensate for the loss of freedom, but would buy an awful lot of taxi trips.

JIM O’Brien Cynthia Road, Poole