The number of people losing their licence to the demerit points system is approaching an epidemic and creating serious hardship to many in NSW. The loss of licence often leads to loss of job or livelihood, and from that point it is not far in these troubled times to loss of house and long-term disadvantage. One Sydney paper reported this week that 60,919 people lost their drivers licence to demerit points in NSW last year, a 50% increase on the previous year and almost double that of 2006. The fact that two low-level speeding offences, less than 15kmh above the limit, in double-point times is enough to take a licence puts this in perspective.

The NSW Roads Minister, Michael Daley, told me this week that his Government is "looking to amend the current demerit point scheme to make it fairer for motorists caught low-range speeding". The points table now is, he says, unduly harsh. As you'd expect Mr Daley makes such correct noises as "the easiest way to avoid copping demerit points is to obey the law".

I believe the Government may reduce the three points lost to a low-level speeding offence to one, and there may be other changes.

Apart from the deterrence and the cumulative impact, the value of demerit points is that they have much the same impact on everyone, rich and poor. The right to drive is the same for all. Fines, on the other hand, have such a massive difference in impact on people of different means that they are an iniquity. A fine of a couple of hundred dollars is nothing to many people, nothing, but to many others it is the week's food for the family. So demerit points are not all bad.

How can the system be further improved?