Dangerous distraction: Phone at the wheel

Drivers who kill while using a mobile phone at the wheel should receive prison sentences of at least two years, judges were told yesterday.

But more than two million rogue drivers who go without insurance will be safe from jail if they kill in an accident.

Even those with a string of previous motoring convictions who kill will not automatically go to prison.

The new rules were laid down by the Sentencing Guidelines Council, the body led by Lord Chief Justice Lord Phillips which gives instruction to the courts.

They set out stronger punishments for the worst drivers whose disregard for danger and the rules of the road cause death.

These - including racers, the persistently dangerous and the incapably drunk - will get up to 14 years in jail.

Killing while distracted by a mobile phone will get a driver a conviction for causing death by dangerous driving and a jail sentence of between two and five years. In the cases of those who have been reading or sending text messages while at the wheel, that will be four to seven years' jail.

However, those who kill because of momentary lapses at the wheel will be treated more leniently.

Those found guilty of the new offence of causing death by careless driving will avoid prison if the accident was the result of a mistake - for example, through pulling out of a side road into the path of another vehicle.

Such offences, more common among older drivers, will be met with a community punishment outside jail and curfews enforced by electronic tags.

More controversial are the rules on dealing with those guilty of another new offence, causing death while driving uninsured or disqualified.

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Under these, the fast-growing group of uninsured drivers, who are also often unlicensed and untaxed, are likely to get a community punishment outside prison if they kill - unless their crime is aggravated by other offences like failing to stop.

The rules were laid down after months of discussions among judges, senior police officers and Crown Prosecution Service officials led by Director of Public Prosecutions Sir Ken MacDonald QC.

Lord Phillips, the most senior judge in England and Wales, said: 'Sentencing in cases where death results from the misuse of a car are among the most difficult for judges and magistrates. The harm is the greatest anyone can inflict - the death of a victim - but the level of culpability can range from a flagrant disregard of the safety of other road users to a terrible moment of inattention.'

Chief Constable Peter Neyroud, head of the National Policing Improvement Agency, said: 'The impact of the guidelines we have drawn up is that there will be more custodial sentences and community sentences where in the past offenders would almost certainly have received a fine for the same driving behaviour.'

But the road safety pressure group Brake said the guidelines are inadequate.

Its chief Mary Williams said: 'We are still left with an inadequate charge structure and inadequate maximum penalties.

'While we welcome the fact that more drivers who commit offences and kill will hopefully now be imprisoned, the law is still woefully lenient to tackle drivers who kill and maim through their own actions with catastrophic consequences for families.'

AA president Edmund King said: 'Hopefully the threat of longer prison sentences will concentrate the minds of motorists and help them realise the dire consequences of even a momentary lapse of concentration at the wheel.

'It would help if we had more traffic police to act as a deterrent to stop these offences taking place before they end in death and tragedy.'