Aftermarket March 2022

A recent report on the potential future legal framework that may be required to allow self-driving cars on UK roads raises questions about where businesses repairing vehicles sit in the process. This in itself raises other questions for garages around the issue of training, and may even take us to the fringes of technician licensing, which is always a controversial topic in itself. Profound legal consequences The driver of a self-driving car, when the car’s systems are doing the driving, will not be legally responsible for its actions, the Law Commission of England and Wales and the Scottish Law Commission concluded in their joint report. According to the report, a whole new legal system to frame these vehicles is needed as a result. The report was commissioned in 2018 by the Centre for Connected and Autonomous Vehicles. It is the summation of three rounds of consultation. Hundreds of stakeholders from the automotive sector and beyond provided input during the process. The report says that “profound legal consequences” will result when a car is able to drive itself for at least part of a journey without a human driver needing to actually control the car. With the driver ceasing to be the accountable entity for road safety, “new systems of safety assurance” will be required. A new Automated Vehicles Act is suggested that would enable the introduction of rules and a legal framework to help administer self-driving cars. Once self-driving cars are on the roads, the report suggests that a new system of accountability will be required. Instead of a driver, the person in the driving seat would be a user-in-charge, with the vehicle backed by an authorised self-driving entity (ASDE) which would be the vehicle manufacturer or software developer. When a vehicle drives itself without a user-in-charge, it would be overseen by a licensed no-user-in-charge (NUIC) operator. “It is expected,” said the report, “that staff in remote operation centres will respond to alerts from vehicles that encounter problems they cannot deal with, break down or become involved in a collision.” While the user-in-charge would not be responsible for what happens when the car is in charge, the report suggests that systems are in place to tell the driver that they need to take over, with a transition demand being made that employs vibration, lights and sound. Meanwhile, it is also recommended that senior managers at the ADSEs and NUIC operators face prosecution if information about a vehicle is incorrect or incomplete. "A senior individual must take responsibility 10 AFTERMARKET MARCH 2022 BIG ISSUE www.aftermarketonline.net SELF-DRIVING CARS: WHERE WILL GARAGES STAND? The potential legal framework that could be created to enable self- driving cars on Britain’s roads could leave garages in an odd position