In Britain you're allowed to drive a car when you're seventeen. You have to get a special two-year driving licence before you can start. When you are learning, someone with a full licence always has to be in the car with you because you are not allowed to drive the car on the road alone. You don't have to go to a driving school—a friend can teach you. The person with you isn't allowed to take money for the lesson unless he's got a teacher's licence.
Before you're allowed to have a full licence, you have to take a driving test. You can take a test in your own car, but it has to be fit for the road. In the test you have to drive round for about half an hour and then answer a few questions. If you don't pass the test, you're allowed to take it again a few weeks later if you want to. In 1970 a woman passed her fortieth test after 212 driving lessons! When you've passed your test, you don't have to take it again, and you're allowed to go on driving as long as you like, if you are healthy. Britain's oldest driver was a man who drove in 1974 at the age of 100.
Before 1904 everyone was allowed to drive, even children. Then from 1940 car drivers had to have a licence. But they didn't have to take a test until 1935. In the early days of car driving, before 1878，cars weren't allowed to go faster than four miles an hour, and someone had to lead the car with a red flag.
