P platers and power restrictions

P platers here in NSW now have restrictions on the vehicles that they are allowed to drive whilst on their p-plates. I'm not a p plater, and haven't been for a long time, but while I agree that the general idea is sensible, it has been poorly thought through, and will probably have little to no effect.
There has been a campaign in recent months in the news papers illustrating every single crash involving a p-plater. This has created a lot of community support for the cause, even though I have seen figures that say p-plater deaths from car accidents have actually decreased in recent years, but reading the paper, you would think that they have trippled in the last 2 months. This isn't the case. It seems that the government has a vested interest in creating a culture of fear on the roads, where they can con the public with their tollways, greed (sorry "speed") cameras.
I get the impression that the whole p plater thing is a smokescreen. Something really important must have been happening behind the scenes in governement during the time that the p plater fuss was happening. The p plate rules are there for the benefit of a majority of naieve middle-aged main-stream news worshipping citizens, so the government can push something past them while they're not looking. Thats the feeling I get anyway.
Lets look at these restrictions:
All V8's are banned. So, if i'm a P plater, I cannot drive a VB commodore v8, but I can drive my V6 VP Commodore which has more power and can get to 100kph quicker. I had to laugh at someone on an ABC forum, they say "V6 faster than a v8?, where's the logic?". Um well... Other things contribute to the power output from an engine than the number of cylinders. If a V6 is more efficient, has better fuel and ignition systems, more efficient valvetrain components, flows better, and may even be of a similar capacity, then of course it will go harder. That's why many newer V6's can and do outperform the older v8 engines. The numbers are there on paper. The person that wrote that is the kind of person the governement is trying to appeal to.
If we were serious about road safety, we would train drivers properly, the roads would have money spent on them and would be wide enough to carry the traffic, and would not be full of holes and dangerous, poorly designed intersections. Roadworks would also not be undertaken during rush-hour times.
All we see are stupid reports on sensationalist shows like "today tonight" where a few young guys get done for having their car 2 cm too low or having the stereo up too loud, and at the end of a long weekend we get a fiqure of how many motorists were caught over the period. I always think, I wonder how many of those were doing less than 10kph over the limit on a straight open road. How many were actually driving dangerously, probably 10 or 20.
Meanwhile, you can't catch a train at night in this city, or you get mugged. You can easilly steal a car in Sydney and get away with it, because it's not considered a serious crime. I guess the problem is that there is no money is busting real criminals, because they don't have any, so they go for the legitimate citizens instead.
Just for the record, and to those mentally challenged people that will say "Just don't speed and you won't have to worry". I don't speed, and haven't had a speeding ticket for years. I just feel I could be a safer driver if I didn't have to look at the spedo constantly whilst driving to make sure I'm not over the magic number by more than 3kph.
Another thing.... Mobile phones. This will annoy some people. If you cant drive properly and safely whilst using a hand-held mobile phone, you shouldn't be driving at all. Especially if you drive an automatic.