The Queensland government has recently introduced new drink driving laws which all drivers in Queensland need to understand.
Under these new laws, anyone caught drink driving with an alcohol concentration of 0.10 or higher will automatically have their driver’s licence suspended until the matter is finalised in court. The previous limit for immediate licence suspensions was 0.15.
The impact of these new laws can have a significant impact on unsuspecting drivers. It can often take a month or more until traffic matters are finalised in courts. This means that if you are caught drink driving with an alcohol concentration of 0.10 or above, you may be unable to drive for at least a month until your matter is finalised.
To make matters even more serious, if your licence is subsequently disqualified by the court, the disqualification period starts from the moment your licence is disqualified by the court. Contrary to what many people assume, the disqualification is not backdated to the date you were actually caught drink driving.
As an example, if you were caught drink driving on 1 July but your next court date is not until 1 August, your licence will be suspended for that one month period. If you then plead guilty on 1 August and your licence is disqualified for 3 months (for example), you will only be able to apply for your licence once more on 1 November. Therefore even though your licence was only disqualified for 3 months, you will have been without your licence for 4 months in total.
If you would like to discuss these new laws with an experienced traffic lawyer, please contact us at your convenience.