A kind of consensus on the roads? Drink driving policy in Britain 1945-1970.

The history of drink driving and legislative responses to it remain virtual terra incognita. This contribution traces developments in Britain between 1945 and the aftermath of the Road Safety Act in 1967. The first section focuses on the formation of an extra-parliamentary pressure group in the 1950s. This is complemented by an interpretation of the impact of the government-backed Drew Report (1959), and the ways in which Drew's research was rhetorically and creatively deployed by Graham Page, leading spokesman for the Pedestrians' Association and Ernest Marples, the Conservative Minister of Transport. The final section interrogates key debates leading up to the introduction of the breathalyser. The article concludes that belated introduction of road safety legislation in Britain in the 1960s revealed a high degree of cross-party consensus. Only senior officials at the Home Office, and to a lesser extent, at the Ministry of Transport, repeatedly threatened to delay reform.