Paralympic gold medallist fronts Goodyear’s Young Driver Education Week

A Paralympic gold medallist will front a week-long campaign organised by Goodyear Tyres to put the spotlight on how UK youngsters are taught to drive.

Josie Pearson MBE, who won gold in the discus in the 2012 Paralympic Games with a world record distance, was paralysed in a young driver car accident when she was just 19.

Now the athlete has thrown her support behind Goodyear’s Young Driver Education Week, a national awareness campaign to spread the word on encouraging earlier young driver education.

Josie said: “After my accident, obviously this whole issue is something very close to my heart and I hope Young Driver Education Week will not only raise questions about how we teach our youngsters but also offer a possible solution.”

The awareness week, which will run from October 14-20, will include a tour of Goodyear’s Driving Academy, which is an online tool teaching the Highway Code in the classroom as well as the opportunity for practical lessons in an enclosed environment such as the school playground.

Michelle Fisher, Goodyear Brand Manager said: “We want to address road-user attitudes and driving behaviour through improved education. The Driving Academy has already given hundreds of children a glimpse of the complexities of driving a car as well as the hazards and we hope youngsters, parents, schools and our MPs will really think about this issue.

“We are meant to have some of the safest roads in the world and yet 133 young people still died in 2012. We need to make pupils as young as 11 realise that driving is about safety not speed and responsibility not recklessness.”

During the week Josie will see the Driving Academy in action at King’s College School, London, and will speak to youngsters about the importance of road safety.