Editorial: Why not drink drivers?

Braedyn Clothiers BMW was crushed on Tuesday.

The crushing of Tauranga boy racer Braedyn Clothier's BMW on Tuesday was Tauranga's first - and only the third in the country - since "boy racer" legislation was introduced in 2009.

The law, which allows police to seize vehicles and destroy them if a driver commits street-racing offences three times within four years, seems to be working as a deterrent. Police attending Tuesday's crushing said it sent a clear message that the law has teeth.

The graphic punishment works on the same principle as confiscating a toddler's favourite toy, or throwing a teenager's iPhone into the sea.

Activity of some boy racers is a safety issue for road users and pedestrians.

They can be anti-social in residential areas, damaging roads and making excessive noise in the night.

Some of them are just hoons who think going round in circles in a loud car is exciting.

There is nowhere else to go to do this in Tauranga - a local tells me in his day they used to do their hooning in Baypark.

In Meremere organised drag racing has had some success in accommodating a need for speed in a more acceptable way than doughnuts in granny's driveway.

Yet Clothier had several warnings.

The crushing is deserved for repeat offenders who flout the law. But in my view there is another group of driving offenders who are equally worthy of the crusher's teeth - drink drivers.

This paper has argued before in editorials: if it's good enough to seize and crush the cars of boy racers, why not drink drivers? Drink drivers, in my view, are far more reckless in a premeditated way than boy racers and do not necessarily have the excuse of youthful idiotic exuberance on their side.

Drink drivers are more lethal idiots. They come from all walks of life and ages. Recently in Tauranga there were three drink driving cases involving a businesswoman, a mother and a woman in her 20s. One had her 8-year-old in the car.

Why do these people receive less punishment than hooning guys guilty of "unnecessary exhibition of speed" or "sustained loss of traction"?

Laws on drink drivers need to be tougher, giving police power to confiscate or crush cars, or better, ban them from driving for the rest of their lives.