The Government may think it can coerce us into sharing but when it comes to our cars, we'd prefer to keep them to ourselves.

LET'S face it, you'll never get us out of our cars. The Government's latest wheeze to keep some cars off the road is to encourage us to share our cars. If we do, we'll be able to use bus lanes. Drivers without passengers will have to stay stuck in the queue. A small price to pay.

As with so many other schemes to make us use our cars more sensibly, it won't work. It won't work because motorists are selfish and lazy, caring little about the greater good and more about their personal comfort. And I speak as one who drives more miles than most.

One of the pleasures of driving a car is the complete independence it gives you, to come and go as and when you will, dependent on no-one, no time table.

More than that, a car is your second home - comfortable, with music. Mine doubles as an extra office - all those papers. It's also an extra wardrobe, with spare shoes, t-shirt and jacket; and a beauty salon, with hot brush, wipes, make-up etc. It's my little world on wheels and it's going to be very, very difficult to prise me out of it. Hard to make me share it, too.

How can I get up and go when the mood takes me, if I have to arrange to take someone else? All that arranging, calling, waiting. Yes, I know, it is only minute or two of your time, but however little the actual inconvenience, it knocks a great hole in that idea of freedom and independence.

One way to coax us from our cars is to encourage us not to use them for short journeys - less than a mile, say. This would save fuel and traffic jams, and control the growing obesity epidemic at the same time. It would all add to the greater happiness - especially if it cut down on school runs.

Money won't do it - we continue to pay tolls and taxes and rocketing fuel prices. Danger won't do it - an average of ten people a day are killed on our roads. If airlines or trains had that sort of statistic, there'd be a national outcry and no-one would go anywhere. But cars are too convenient, and anyway, it won't happen to us, will it?

The only way to get us out of cars would be if it was easier to hop on a bus than find a parking place. It's why some park and ride schemes are a success.

The only real breakthrough will be when public transport is as quick, clean and convenient as getting into your car. So don't hold your breath.

For if the bus lanes are full of cars, where will the buses go?

Why a ban won't banish abuse

THE new law on smacking, however fudged, is going to cause more problems than it solves. Public opinion has long since moved against smacking children as routine. Most parents do it only in those rare moments of total exasperation or extreme danger.

Most of us, too, know the difference between a smack and child abuse. Would a ban on smacking have helped save the life of Victoria Climbie? Of course not.

We have other laws to protect children - those against underage sex and underage drinking, for instance. If the anti-smacking law is policed as well as those two, parents will still be able to smack away with all the enthusiasm of a Victorian workhouse master.

And no-one will do anything about it.

FORGET retail therapy - one in four women hates shopping for clothes, according to new research by retail analyst Mintel. Well, we could have told them that.

If you look at the average High Street, 90 per cent of the shops are geared towards about 20 per cent of the population - generally under 25-year-olds of average height, who take size 8-12.

For the rest of us, most of the so-called fashions are too small, too big, too short, too long, too expensive, too naff, too tarty or too frumpy. And we look vainly to find something between the plunging lurex crop top and the polyester elastic waist, and which might actually fit.

Supermarkets might have killed off the butchers and bakers. But when it comes to fashion, the High Street chains are committing slow suicide. And they wonder why more of us prefer to buy our clothes from small companies by mail order or the Internet. Or just keep wearing last year's favourites.

WELL done Mrs Justice Bracewell. She has ruled that two girls should live with their father after their mother repeatedly prevented him from seeing his daughters and lied and made false accusations to stop him. But before that sensible decision was reached, 17 court orders had been issued against the mother. She ignored them all.

It's good that natural justice has finally triumphed. But why has it taken so long? And what's to prevent other parents - and, more importantly, children - going through the same long, drawn-out process?

WHO said machines don't have feelings? After seven years, I decided to buy a new computer. I ordered it online using the old computer. It took the entire afternoon because the old computer was sulking. It knew it was going to be replaced and just refused to co-operate. Eventually, with the promise of nice desk upstairs and a brand new phone line, I coaxed it back into working.

A week later, I decided to email the new computer company and check the delivery date. Big mistake. The old computer was so upset, it decided to fill its files with Japanese phone numbers, hundreds and hundreds of them. Then it crashed completely and did the computer version of holding its breath until it went purple and lost all its files.

If this column ever appears it will be a miracle. It proves again the truth of that wonderful phrase - the positive animosity of inanimate objects. You never had these problems with typewriters and carbon paper.

BE still my beating heart. Just before the computer threw a wobbly, I was delighted to discover that I had apparently won $4,000,000 in a global lottery. Sorry, a "golbal lotry". As the rest of the spelling and grammar was equally dodgy and as it was asking me to divvy up a wodge of dosh in tax before I got my cheque, I decided to give it a miss. If something looks too good to be true, sadly, it generally is.

Published: 07/07/2004