Blog: The limitations of ALKS

The recent announcement by the Department for Transport regarding a limited form of driverless car being permitted in certain circumstances by the end of 2021 has brought forward an issue that has long been on the minds of UK insurers. The motivation for the DfT to enable automation is clear with the prospect of fewer accidents due to removal of human error combined with a reduced congestion due to more efficient use of transport flows.

Vehicles enabled with ALKS are not actually driverless cars, ALKS is vehicle technology that keeps a car within its lane while also controlling speed. The driver, however, cannot ‘switch off’ but must be on hand to intervene should the system advise. Use is to be limited initially to motorways and the maximum speed to 37mph. Drivers must be able to respond within 10 seconds if required and if there is no driver response, ALKS will slow the car down, put on the hazard lights and eventually stop.

The DfT announced a call for evidence on the issue in August 2020 and has now published the results. The research paper arising from the study found that the type of tasks carried out by those who surrendered control was related to mobile phones in 80% of cases. When called upon to take back control of the car, the study also found that there was a period of re-calibration afterwards where for a few seconds there was the potential for lane drift. The Foil response to the call to evidence raised this point last year, whether or not the 10 seconds provided for transition was too long. Another issue raised was how ALKS vehicles would detect low impact collisions.

The concern we have expressed previously is that it is misleading to classify ALKS as autonomous under the Automated and Electric Vehicles Act (2018). The key point is that ALKS is a feature to assist drivers, like automatic emergency braking or lane assist, and should not be seen as something replacing drivers.

One of the difficulties surrounding autonomous vehicles more generally is attribution of fault. In the US it took two years to investigate a fatal incident dating back to 2018 involving a Tesla vehicle in ‘autopilot’ mode – it turned out that the driver had not taken back control of the car when asked to due to playing a game on his phone. The car’s collision avoidance scheme was not able to detect the crash barrier. More recently there has been another Tesla fatality in 2021 where nobody was in the driving seat at all.

Since the concept of driverless vehicles emerged insurers have been grappling with scenarios concerning liability where it may be difficult to work out who is at fault, the driver of the autonomous car, the driving system itself or another vehicle involved? What if the driving system has to make a choice between two (or more) potential ‘victims’? This brings ethics or moral judgments into the decision making process.

Then there is the complicated issue of insurance of autonomous cars. Will a driver who has no control be required to hold insurance? Or will liability transfer to the manufacturer? The Automated and Electric Vehicles Act proposes strict liability for autonomous vehicles where the manufacturers will be liable for the damage caused when the vehicle was driving itself. However while ALKS may be a step towards being autonomous it does not fulfil all of the criteria set out in the 2018 legislation for a self-driving vehicle so that ‘passing liability’ provision does not apply.

There have also been concerns about data capture and the level of data retention that will be needed. Also who will capture and maintain such data? Intel has predicted that an autonomous car will generate around four terabytes of data in 90 minutes of driving, much more than originally expected.

While ALKS is another step towards fully-fledged autonomous vehicles on our roads, it can only be used in a very limited set of circumstances, for the moment at least. With the technology picking up pace, it might not be long before we do see ALKS use expanded and more advanced systems as a regular feature of our roads and insurers handling of claims having to adapt as a result. However while the headlines are around self-driving cars coming to our roads in 2021, there is still a lot of work to happen before that becomes a reality, starting next with a consultation on the changes needed to the Highway Code.