When I moved back to live in the U.K. a bit over a year ago, I found it necessary to renew my U.K. Driving License, and I got one of the new photo I.D. card ones. However, it also came with a document called the License Counterpart. It contains a little bit (but not very much) more information about me and my driving rights than appear on the license card itself. Also, there were instructions that, as I read them, tell me that it is important to always keep the License card and the Counterpart document together.
Now this makes no sense to me. I would expect, normally, to carry my license with me whenever I am driving (as is the law in California, where I was previously living, and as I generally did with my old British license too). The new license card is small enough to be conveniently carried in a pocket or wallet. However, the Counterpart is an A4 sheet of quite thick paper that would really not be convenient to carry all the time. Therefore, because of the instructions to keep them together, I have been leaving both my license card and the Counterpart at home, even when I am driving.
Unlike in the U.S.A. (or, at least, California) it is not the law in Britain that one must actually be carrying one’s license when driving, and although one may be asked to produce it if stopped by the police in connection with a traffic infraction or other incident, if one cannot produce it on the spot it is quite acceptable to bring it to a police station within a few days of the incident. It is also very rarely necessary in Britain to provide a photo I.D., so the license is not needed for that. (There was a thread about this last point, in MPSIMS I think, not too long ago.)
Nevertheless, I would still like to carry my license with me when I am driving, or even otherwise when I am out. If I ever do get stopped by the police, it will certainly be more convenient to be able to show them my license then and there, rather than having to schlep into a police station to do it later on, and it is also not impossible that I might very occasionally find I need photo I.D. for something else. It also seems to me that it makes sense to keep the license and Counterpart separately for security reasons. If one is lost or stolen, I will still have the other to prove its existence, and a thief will not have both, which will limit his ability to misuse them.
However, because of the instructions to keep them together, I have been doing so, and not carrying either. But the more I think about these instructions, the less sense they make to me. Am I correct in understanding them to say that the License card and the Counterpart must be kept physically together at all times? (It seem to say so pretty clearly, but I just don’t get why.) If yes, do most British people actually do this, and leave both at home as I have been doing (or carry both), or is it a regulation that is honoured much more in the breach than in the observance, and that actually no-one really ever gets in trouble for disobeying? (Also, if yes to the first question, what the hell is the point of this ludicrous regulation?)
