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Is it illegal to drink alcohol in a car while driving?

Is it illegal Safety Urban Hacks
The nation-wide blood alcohol limit for fully licenced drivers is 0.05.
Iain Kelly
Contributing Journalist
4 Jun 2018
3 min read
4 Comments

​Yes and no, as the laws vary according to state legislation.

While Australia is known as a nation of alcohol-loving rouges, it's mostly illegal to drink an alcoholic beverage while driving. New South Wales, Tasmania, Queensland, the ACT and Victoria all have explicit laws forbidding a driver drinking alcoholic beverages.

Interestingly enough we were unable to find legislation explicitly forbidding drivers from consuming alcohol while driving in Western Australia, South Australia, or the Northern Territory. It is still illegal to drive over the prescribed blood alcohol limit in those states and territories, however.

The nation-wide blood alcohol limit for fully licenced drivers is 0.05, which can catch some American tourists unawares as there are states in the USA which have 0.08 blood alcohol limits. Another way some drivers are caught out is by failing to remember the limit is 0.05 so you need to blow 0.049 to be clear to drive.
 
For Learner and Provisional drivers around Australia there is a zero-tolerance for any alcohol. People driving trucks over 13 tonnes or carrying dangerous goods, buses, taxis and other public vehicles have a zero limit in Victoria, but this rises to 0.02 in NSW.

A breath test is a measurement of the grams of alcohol your body has processed that is in 100ml of your blood, and so is affecting your blood stream. What can make this tricky is that your body will process the booze over time, so an incredible amount of factors can affect your breathalyser reading, including your weight, height, food intake during that day, amount of sleep you’ve had, stress, heat of the day, how active you have been, and more.
 
The generally accepted mantra is that the average male can drink up to two standard drinks in the first hour, and up to one standard drink per-hour after that. For women it is generally up to one standard drink per-hour.
 
Where some people are caught unawares is forgetting that most bottles of beer are over one standard drink each, though they will have the number of standard drinks per-serve printed on them, so that makes it easier to track.
 
However, beer, wine and spirits sold in glasses won’t have that information readily available, and many will be over one standard drink per-glass. If you’re drinking pints, they can often be nearly two standard drinks per-glass!

If you have any doubts about your ability to drive, or whether you are over the limit, don’t drive. The risk to yourself and others in society are far heavier than the brutal penalties handed out if you are caught.

NSW’s rules on alcohol can be found here.

VicRoads’ rules can be viewed here.

Queensland’s rules are here.

This article is not intended as legal advice. You should check with your local road authority to verify the information written here is suitable to your situation before driving in this manner.

Have you ever been tempted to take an alcoholic sip behind the wheel? Tell us in the comments below?

Iain Kelly
Contributing Journalist
A love of classic American and European cars drove Iain Kelly to motoring journalism straight out of high school, via the ownership of a tired 1975 HJ Holden Monaro.  For nearly 20 years he has worked on magazines and websites catering to modified late model high-performance Japanese and European tuner cars, as well as traditional hot rods, muscle cars and street machines. Some of these titles include Auto Salon, LSX Tuner, MOTOR, Forged, Freestyle Rides, Roadkill, SPEED, and Street Machine. He counts his trip to the USA to help build Mighty Car Mods’ “Subarute” along with co-authoring their recent book, The Cars of Mighty Car Mods, among his career highlights.  Iain lends his expertise to CarsGuide for a variety of advice projects, along with legitimising his automotive obsession with regular OverSteer contributions. Although his practical skills working on cars is nearly all self-taught, he still loves nothing more than spending quality time in the shed working on his project car, a 1964 Pontiac. He also admits to also having an addiction to E30 BMWs and Subaru Liberty RS Turbos, both of which he has had multiple examples of. With car choices like that, at least his mum thinks he is cool.
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