Tailgaters. You are twats.

I seem to be particularly plagued by tailgaters at the moment. For non-British readers, these are not people who enjoy communal picnics out of the back of their cars, but the rude and dangerous idiots who drive too close to the car in front.

On Thursday night, in a long, slow-moving queue of traffic at roadworks, I was tailgated for about a mile by a white van, honking and flashing continually in annoyance at my leaving a safe gap between me and the car in front, or whenever I let someone in from a side road. Hint: I can't move out of your way, there's nowhere to go, and I can't move forward, because there's a car in front of me. So chill out.

Last night, I was overtaking a long line of traffic, doing about 50mph (the limit) in the outside lane. I saw a car approaching so fast in my mirror that I actually thought he was going to ram me, but instead he tailgated me at a distance of about a centimetre, holding down his horn continually. Hint: I can't move over until there's a gap in the left-hand lane, and I'm not going to break the speed limit for you, because Sod's Law dictates that it would be me that gets the ticket.

This afternoon, I was tailgated by a bright red American Ford, not honking or flashing, just driving much too close. As soon as I could safely move over, I did, and he pulled in ahead of me, and stopped so sharply that I had to almost stand on the brakes - he wanted to take the turn off directly in front of me. It's not often that someone manages to almost hit the back and the front of my car in the space of a couple of minutes. It was a nasty moment, but I managed to stop. Fortunately, the car behind me was leaving a safe gap, or there would have been at least a three-car pile-up.

I'm never quite sure how to deal with tailgating. I know the safe and sensible thing to do is to get out of the way, but I instinctively feel this just encourages people to tailgate, because they know it works. On the other hand, it's not good driving to block the outside lane when it's safe to move over, and it's not fair to other drivers to slow down just to annoy the tailgater.

I thought I'd have a look for advice on the Web and I found this page:

Tailgating

which has the following advice:

Do not get angry. Concentrate instead on the safety of you, your passengers and your vehicle. You're going to do whatever you can to:

a) get rid of the tailgater as soon as possible and

b) minimize the risk of him running into you until he's gone.

You're going to do your best to make a difficult situation safe. Remember it does not matter at all if he gets in front of you. In fact you're better off if he does, because he's dangerous and if he's in front you can keep your eye on him and leave safe gaps.

Teaching him a lesson - any lesson - is absolutely not in your best interests. Being tailgated is stressful. Stressed drivers take risks and make mistakes. Use any realistic strategy to reduce stress and risk.

and advises you to leave an extra-large gap between you and the car in front, because the tailgater has no gap and thus no time to brake if you have to. This is probably pretty good advice. Keep yourself safe, and get the tailgater in front of you as soon as possible where he's no longer a threat.

If you are a tailgater (and I've done it myself on occasion, out of frustration, or being in an extreme hurry, or a bad mood), stop it. It's both frightening and aggravating to the person being tailgated, as we all know from having been in that position ourselves. Don't be part of the problem. If someone is lane-blocking, keep a safe and polite distance behind them (2 second gap), and give them an occasional flash of the headlights to remind them that you're there. Don't use the horn. If you can see that they can't safely move in to the left, just wait - tailgating or flashing might panic them into making an unsafe move and possibly causing an accident.

Bear in mind that at night, cars behind seem closer due to their headlights, so you may need to leave a larger gap to avoid the person in front having that sensation of someone breathing down his neck. That's fine. You're both travelling at the same speed, whatever the gap, so you won't get there any slower. But you will have avoided being an asshole. Which is nice.

[ Edit: Tailgaters and phone users are Britain's most dangerous drivers - Institute of Advanced Motorists ]