French minister backs licence suspensions for phone use while driving
The measure could be rolled out nationwide; it is currently being trialled in four departments
It comes after a rise in road fatalities across France
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Using a mobile phone in any capacity while driving could soon result in immediate suspension of your driving licence across the whole of France, after a minister said she is in favour of the idea.
Marie-Pierre Vedrenne, junior interior minister, said she was in favour of making the measure a nationwide law as a way to improve road safety. The measure is currently being trialled across four departments.
“Given the figures [on road deaths], given the consequences, yes, it is perhaps necessary to extend these proposals,” she told RMC on May 13.
“We have a rising [fatality] curve; this is unacceptable, so we need to put various measures in place to both implement a prevention policy and tighten up penalties,” she said.
Trial departments
Currently, the stricter rules are being trialled in four departments: Landes, Lot-et-Garonne, Pas-de-Calais, and Charente-Maritime.
In these departments, prefects have authorised officers to request an immediate licence suspension based solely on phone use, citing road safety concerns and local accident data.
A fifth department, Ardèche, plans to introduce the measure on June 1.
Charente-Maritime introduced the trial measure on May 1, after having recorded 45 road deaths in 2025 according to provisional data – four more than the previous year. Mobile phone use has been identified as a factor in seven fatal accidents in the department.
In Lot-et-Garonne, fatalities also rose by four, reaching 27. Landes has not yet published its final figures for the year.
When announcing the measure, Charente-Maritime prefect Brice Blondel said the authorities preferred to have stricter rules, in comparison to having “a body on the side of the road”. He said that deaths linked to distraction were avoidable.
Mobile phone use at the wheel is responsible for around 400 deaths a year in France, according to a 2025 study by car insurance body Assurance Prévention/Calyxis.
The study adds that reading a text message typically takes 13 seconds, during which time a vehicle travelling at 130km/h can cover 470m, without the driver ever looking ahead.
Under current national road traffic law, holding a phone while driving is punishable by a fixed fine of €135 and the loss of three points from the perpetrator’s licence.
And since 2020, police and gendarmes have also been able to confiscate a licence immediately if a driver is caught using a phone while committing another offence, such as speeding, ignoring a red light or failing to respect safety distances.
This can be followed by a suspension of up to six months.
