From the beginning of 2015 , Britain is embarking upon an experiment with driverless cars . Transport Minister Claire Perry has already labeled it `` transformational . '' In Perry 's perfect world it 'll be the precursor to millions of driverless cars on our roads . For many , it has all the constituents of a recipe for disaster . And for the realists it 's unlikely to happen in a major way for at least a couple of decades . According to Perry , driverless cars will help out harassed mums by taking on the school run . They 'll give disabled people who currently ca n't drive the power of self-mobility . And best of all , they 'll scythe into that irritating statistic that says 90 % of road crashes are caused by human error . For many people , driverless cars are an alien concept . Car maker Volvo says 2012 data showed only half of 18-37 year-olds were ready for the driverless car revolution . That means half of this digitally-savvy age group were n't . Perry cites the technology as being the barrier for humans getting to grips with driverless cars . She 's wrong . In 2014 , more than two million new cars will be sold in the UK . A significant proportion will feature the cruise control , self-parking systems , autonomous emergency braking and lane departure warning that enable a car to be driverless . We 're more than used to the technology . We understand computers are more than capable of reacting correctly to situations they 've been programmed to deal with . But we also know our roads are an incredibly complex , constantly evolving and entirely unpredictable environment . Despite all our laws and rules , roads are random , like humans . Consequently we are brilliant at reading the situations we find ourselves in ; accidents happen because we just do n't react correctly . The result of this is that having driverless cars sharing the road with human-driven vehicles has chaos written all over it . And we 're not just talking mayhem at street level . Multiple car makers agree that the technology is already fit for purpose . It 's the legislation and logistics that need sorting out . To operate safely , self-driving cars need to talk to each other . They need to identify cars that are parked and therefore not a threat . If they 're traveling in a convoy at motorway speed -- `` platooning '' as it 's called -- Car A needs to tell Cars B and C to the side and behind that it wants to come off at the next junction . Then Car B needs to tell car D behind that it 's slowing down to let Car A in and so on . The only way this can work is if they talk the same language . Some car makers are currently working on this but industry insiders say the specifics are unlikely to be agreed much before 2030 . They have n't even agreed how much control the computers should take . Should they drive all the time ? Or would humans retain some control ? Once they have agreed that , drivers will need training . If you 're buying a car that 's going to hold your life in its computerized hands , the majority of responsible adults will want more than the 10-minute handover chat from a salesperson already preoccupied with how to spend their month-end bonus . And if the car then crashed because its human had n't operated it properly , who would be liable ? Does the owner 's insurance cough up ? Is it the manufacturer who sold you the car but did n't brief you properly ? Or the third party who supplied the manufacturer with the technology ? Again more questions . In an effort to answer some of these , the UK Government has set up a £10m ( $ 16m ) fund to look at how driverless cars can be integrated into everyday life in the UK . That sounds great , except £10m barely gets you off the driveway in car industry terms . A major manufacturer such as Ford will spend 100 times that just on marketing a new model . Let 's assume the government does find some answers , will Mrs Smith really be able to trust her car to take Tarquin and Mungo to school ? What happens if Mungo starts feeling sick ? Or Tarquin 's left his maths homework on the kitchen table ? I 'd hazard a computer will struggle with those little everyday challenges that we humans absorb so brilliantly . Perhaps more importantly , is just how much control we would cede . I would be happy to let a car do the driving in a slow-moving motorway traffic jam . I 'm not sure about driverless cars in a congested urban environment . And I 'm even less certain about having cars running around without a capable driver even in them . Perry is right : driverless cars could be transformational . But at the moment , there are too many questions to know if that 's going to be in a good way .
The UK government has announced a £10 million fund to research driverless cars . Transport Minister Claire Perry says the technology could be `` transformational '' But James Foxall says driverless cars are programed but humans are random . Driverless cars sharing the road with human-driven vehicles could be chaotic , he says .