The BBC points to what is possibly the country's oldest active driver.
Widow Sheila Thomson makes the 15-mile round trip in her Peugeot 106 from her home in Broughty Ferry, near Dundee, to church in Invergowrie every Sunday.
She has been driving for over 70 years, but has never held a licence because she first got behind the wheel before driving tests were introduced.
I don't know the specifics of the law but it seems to me that regardless of whether or not a driving license was required when Mrs Thomson first began driving, a license is required now.
Is her driving without a license not illegal? Is there an official recognition that she was an active and safe driver before the introduction of driving tests which allows her to legally continue this act?
I can't speak for the skills of Mrs Thomson, but there are certainly more than a few atrociously bad elderly drivers on our roads: are they legally driving without a license too?
Update 03/04/2010:
Interestingly, at some point since I wrote this article the leading quote was edited:
Mrs Thomson has been driving for more than 70 years but has never sat a test because she first got behind the wheel before they were introduced.
There is no longer any mention of her not having a licence; merely that she never sat a driving test to obtain one.
Unfortunately this edit was made silently, so there is no indication of when it occurred. It's also difficult to know whether the article was edited in retrospect due to an original journalistic error, or because someone realised that it revealed something that people might not be too happy about…
