MattSafe gets teens to sign safe-driving contract at first-ever workshop

Young drivers at the MattSafe Safe Driving Workshop 
on Saturday (l-r) Pierre Foster, Shawn Lewis, Samara
Smith, Marzeta Bodden

Devin Chisholm, (left) signs the MattSafe Contract, 
with his father (centre) and his aunt

Thursday, January 29, 2004

The Mathew Thompson Committee (MattSafe) launched the first Safe Driving Workshop on Saturday, 24 January, at the Agape Church in George Town. It is intended to be the first in a series of similar workshops over the coming year.

Saturday's programme was for all teenaged drivers who will be eligible for driving in 2004. Ten sets of young drivers, accompanied by their parents, came to the workshop.

The event began with an introductory talk from Patricia Ebanks who spoke about how it felt to lose her son in a car accident. 

According to MattSafe, more teenagers are killed on the world's roads than any other group of drivers, and road accidents are the leading cause of death for this population segment.

In the Cayman Islands, the number of teenage road accident deaths has increased dramatically in recent years, and the figure for 2002 accounted for more than half the total for the previous 10-year period.

The MattSafe plan involves getting parents and their teenagers to sign a contract. If the driver completes a year without breaking the contract conditions, they receive a MattSafe certificate.

Features in the plan involve a "How's My Driving?" bumper sticker, with a telephone number that people can use to report dangerous driving, and the information is relayed to the young driver's family. 

Another feature of the MattSafe plan is a special four-hour course in safe driving, called the Smith System, which is being made available through the Texaco Company to MattSafe contract signers.

Suggestions that MattSafe has for safe driving include:

• Prevent convoy travel with other teen drivers;
• Restrict night driving;
• Restrict the number of teen passengers;
• Prohibit the use of cell phones while driving.

Rayle Robert, from the organisation Caribbean Haven, said he wished to change the myths surrounding drinking and driving, "For example, that food will sober you up, that dancing will sober you up, that you can sweat alcohol out." 

Orlando Ramos, a young driver who came along to MattSafe with his mother, said that he had learned about being a responsible driver. "I crashed my mother's car," he said, "so she thought it was a good idea that I came up here." 

For further information on MattSafe, contact 244-1755 or MattSafe@gov.ky 

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