Do you feel confident having one or two drinks and then driving home? According to Ontario’s new impaired driving laws which took effect on May 1st, even a blood alcohol level of 0.05 and 0.08 which is the “warn range” will get your license suspended for 3 days. If you are caught with a similar blood alcohol level a second time your license will be suspended for 7 days and you will have to attend an alcohol education program. A third time will result in a license suspension for 30 days and you will have to complete a remedial alcohol treatment program and have an ignition interlock condition placed on your license for six months. Roadside license suspensions cannot be appealed and will be recorded on your record.
These measures may seem drastic but statistics show that drivers whose blood alcohol level is from 0.05 to 0.08 are about seven times more likely         to be involved in a fatal collision than someone who has not been drinking and in 2005, one of every six fatally injured drinking drivers had a blood alcohol level of less than 0.08. What do you think know?

The reality is that it appears that we are moving towards zero tolerance. An Ontario law that would impose a zero blood alcohol limit on all drivers 21 and under is expected to come into effect during the summer of 2010. How long do you think it will take until that law will be imposed on all drivers? Most of us feel comfortable driving after we’ve had one or two drinks. Are we deluding ourselves?