- It is the law that drivers can read a license plate from a distance of 20 meters (since 2001)
It is estimated that around 1 million people drive illegally because their eyesight falls below the UK’s minimum legal requirement, This is Money can exclusively reveal.
The Road Traffic Act 1937 states that drivers must be able to read a vehicle’s number plate from 20 meters (or approximately 65 feet) in good daylight.
However, new data from Churchill Motor Insurance, which teamed up with opticians Hodd, Barnes and Dickens to test drivers who had not had an eye test for more than two years, found that one in 10 drivers I couldn’t read a minimum license plate. legal distance.
The study estimates that 2.8 million people have never had an eye exam in adulthood.
Driving with poor vision can have serious consequences, both for the motorist and for other road users. Department of Transportation data shows that driving with uncorrected vision problems was involved in 182 fatal or serious crashes in 2023.
Calling these results “incredibly worrying”, optician Abbas Pirbhai said: “Many drivers do not realize that even minor vision problems can significantly reduce their ability to see signs, the dashboard, pedestrians and other cars, affecting their ability to drive safely.
It is estimated that a staggering million people drive illegally because their eyesight falls below the UK’s minimum legal requirement. This is what Money can exclusively reveal after Churchill Motor Insurance teamed up with leading opticians Hodd, Barnes and Dickens to test driver eyesight.
After surveying 2,000 adults, it was revealed that a quarter of them had not had an eye exam in two years.
More than half of people (60 percent) who had never had an eye exam said they did not feel they needed an exam because they felt they could “see well.”
Most surprising is that 7 percent (representing 3.5 million drivers) suspect that their vision is not legal on the road.
Even knowing that it is necessary to wear glasses or contact lenses when driving does not mean that people will wear them: Eight percent of respondents who need glasses for driving admit that they only use them “sometimes” or “rarely.”
Another 2 percent confessed that they never wear prescription glasses when driving.
Worse still, a quarter of those who drive without glasses admit they couldn’t read traffic signs, while 29 per cent admitted to having had an incident because they couldn’t see clearly.
Being able to read a number plate from a distance of 20 meters (with glasses or contact lenses if necessary) has been a legal vision requirement in the UK since September 2001.
When people were asked about their experiences driving without prescription glasses or contact lenses, it clearly highlighted how little key information drivers could see on the road.
Twenty-five percent of those surveyed stated that they had failed to read traffic signs, while 14 admitted to having hit an object and 15 percent had been in an accident. Twenty-one percent had almost had an accident.
While some people would attribute it to irresponsible behavior, for others there is also a question of costs at play.
More than a quarter (27 percent) said the cost of getting an eye exam and obtaining the required prescription had deterred them from getting tested.
Nicholas Mantel, director of Churchill Motor Insurance, commented: ‘Our roads are safer when every driver takes responsibility not only for their vehicle but also for their own health and ability to drive safely.
“Vision tends to deteriorate slowly, so drivers may not notice deteriorating vision unless they undergo regular testing.”
Worse still, a quarter of those who drive without glasses admit they couldn’t read traffic signs, while 29 per cent admitted to having had an incident because they couldn’t see clearly.