Some time ago in our local town, an elderly woman wove her way between oncoming cars as if navigating an obstacle course. In a sense, that was precisely what she was doing, since she hadn’t noticed she was heading the wrong way down a one-way street. Her frown suggested she thought it was the rest of us who were out of order by not clearing a path for her. Another day, a neighbour of advanced years, whose car had been boxed in, called my husband out of a café to assist her. Since he cannot drive, she was obliged to seek help elsewhere.

All across the country, every hour of the day, older drivers are making mistakes, causing problems or finding themselves in a fix. Some I know are immobile when on terra firma, their cars their only source of unimpeded movement. Should anything happen that required them to step out of their vehicles, they would need a hand to retrieve their zimmer or wheelchair from the boot.

But before you think this is a diatribe against aged car owners and their diminishing powers, let me add that younger people can be every bit as heedless and inept. Shortly after passing my test, I went the wrong way up a one-way street in Edinburgh’s Old Town, too busy talking to pay attention to the signs.

On more than a few occasions in my city years, passing strangers (always male) took it upon themselves to guide me into a parking space, working their arms like windmills in the middle of the road, bawling “hard down on the left” as I grew increasingly flustered. Decidedly worse, a friend, in a dash for the airport in France, reversed up the empty motorway to take the exit he’d just missed.

You could, of course, say that others shouldn’t be judged by a handful of woeful drivers. To an extent, that is true. Yet from what I regularly witness on the road – on the M8 approach to Glasgow, say, or at rush hour in any town, or when parents are collecting children from school – a huge number of us are far from perfect when it comes to obeying the highway code or parallel parking. Some, indeed, make an art of inventively and wantonly flouting the rules.

Given that there are careless and clueless drivers across the age spectrum, the opprobrium heaped on pensioners can feel deeply unjust. The worst most of them are guilty of is being slow: exiting junctions more like crabs than hares; reversing so cautiously the season changes before your eyes, and so on. While this requires patience for those champing at the bit behind them – a virtue few drivers possess – it is not in itself a major problem.

Sadly, however, there are profoundly serious issues relevant to older drivers that cannot be glossed over or ignored. The tragic case of three-year-old Xander Irvine, who was killed when 91-year-old Edith Duncan lost control of her car in Morningside in Edinburgh and ran into him and his mother, highlights a danger almost exclusively specific to the elderly.

It was only after this accident that Duncan, who has since died, was diagnosed with dementia. While rare, this accident is too awful to be dismissed as a random event, not relevant to public safety. Quite the opposite. With an increasingly ageing population, such incidents will probably become more likely.

A road fatality arising from someone with dementia is thankfully uncommon, but those of us with elderly relatives or friends will be uncomfortably aware that there are times when people who should not get behind the wheel often do so, despite evidence of mental decline.

At the moment, drivers over 70 must reapply for their licence every three years, giving details of health issues and medication. The judge in the fatal accident inquiry into Xander Irvine’s death, Sheriff Principal Nigel Ross, was very clear that the current system of self-certification is wholly inadequate.

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Not only does it rely on the driver giving accurate information, he said, but “it fails to recognise that driving ability may decline with age, or that dementia sufferers may be unaware of their own condition”. His recommendation is that all drivers over 80 should undergo a short cognitive test, to prove their road-worthiness. If this test could be introduced at 75, he suggested, that would be even better.

Relinquishing the car keys is, for some, unthinkable, and happens only under duress, usually in the form of family pressure. Not being allowed to drive can feel like a drastic loss of independence, a signpost on the road to senility and the care home.

That is why self-certification is so inadequate a gauge. It relies both on honesty and self-awareness. In the hope of evading disqualification, some will be economical with the truth. But, even if a person is scrupulously honest by nature, one of the qualities of dementia is the inability to think rationally. Where once somebody might have recognised when they were no longer fit to drive, their clarity and self-knowledge are eroded. Unless loved ones help them complete the form, the likelihood of them informing the DVLA that they have dementia is slim. Many, such as Edith Duncan, will be unaware of their condition. Others, who have received a diagnosis, might not remember it.

(Image: Should the rules be tighter?)

Harsh as it sounds, the state has a duty to protect its citizens, and obliging octogenarians to take a cognitive test is eminently sensible. Who, in their right mind, could deny that?

A few might complain that this reinforces an ageist agenda, stigmatising older drivers despite the fact that many of them are wholly competent. Given the stakes, however, that surely is a risk worth taking. We are quick enough to denounce young drivers, whose lack of experience and love of speed can be calamitous. Most of us would be happy to see restrictions placed on youthful licence holders, to protect them as well as others. So why baulk at a compulsory intervention with the elderly?

Since the chance of succumbing to dementia increases with advanced age, screening for it is common sense. After all, despite the way some people behave, driving is not a right. To be in charge of a potentially lethal machine is a heavy responsibility. Whatever their age, drivers must prove they are fit for the task.