Playing Devil's advocate for a moment...
I had this discussion at work today. The letter of the law states "No person shall drive a motor vehicle on a road if s/he is using a hand-held mobile telephone...". Just wondering if you could prove you were not actually 'driving' then you couldn't be found guilty of the offence. 'Driving' has, by dint of case law, come to mean 'having control of brakes and steering'. If you could prove AP was on at the relevant time then there is a fair chance a sympathetic (Tesla-owning?) magistrate might agree that you were not technically driving. Of course you still have ultimate responsibility for the safety of your car but that is a separate matter and I wouldn't mind betting a canny lawyer might get away with it.
If so, it opens a potentially huge can of worms. One thing's for sure, the real winners will be the lawyers! MW
I had this discussion at work today. The letter of the law states "No person shall drive a motor vehicle on a road if s/he is using a hand-held mobile telephone...". Just wondering if you could prove you were not actually 'driving' then you couldn't be found guilty of the offence. 'Driving' has, by dint of case law, come to mean 'having control of brakes and steering'. If you could prove AP was on at the relevant time then there is a fair chance a sympathetic (Tesla-owning?) magistrate might agree that you were not technically driving. Of course you still have ultimate responsibility for the safety of your car but that is a separate matter and I wouldn't mind betting a canny lawyer might get away with it.
If so, it opens a potentially huge can of worms. One thing's for sure, the real winners will be the lawyers! MW