Who says we are too old to drive?

"I'll be about an hour," says 87-year-old 'queen of the road' Claire Meredith, zipping off in her little Honda Civic. "I've got to run somebody to the shops."

An hour later and the soon-to-be great great grandmother pulls back into the parking space outside her home in Shrewsbury, the first motoring errand of the day in the bag and a few extra yards on the mile-o-meter of driving experience.

Mrs Meredith is one in a million – because that, for the first time, is the number of drivers aged 80 and over now on Britain's roads, according to new DVLA figures.

In Shropshire alone there are 9,916 octogenarians on the highway.

Britain – and counties like Shropshire in particular – may have an ageing population, but the number that appears on your birthday card is no longer a barrier to an independent life behind the wheel.

The Office of National Statistics predicts there will be 8.7 million people over the age of 75 by 2033. This will represent a increase of 81.1 per cent of over 75-year-olds since 2008 – some 4.8 million people.

But contrary to common assumptions, drivers in their eighties are not dangerous. The DVLA figures show that they are in fact much safer than their more youthful counterparts.

The rate of deaths and serious injuries in crashes among drivers over 80 is three times less than the rate for those aged 17-19. In 2010 almost one young driver aged 17-19 was killed or seriously injured per thousand licence holders.

So who makes the best drivers? Who are the kings and queens of the open road? The old-timers or the new pretenders to their bucket-seat thrones?

Mrs Meredith passed her driving test, first time, in 1953 in an Austin A30, "a little bubble of a car", she says.

"There were no tick-tick indicators then, we had to do hand signals," she says, waving her outstretched right hand round in little circles to indicate her intention to hang a left.

"I learnt to drive because I was working at the MEB at the time and my husband and I were coming home from work one night and this fog came down. My husband was driving the car and I had to walk a few yards in front of him saying 'this way'.

"It was 11 lessons for £10, including the cost of your test." The open road has been hers for the driving her ever since. She believes that experience makes older motorists better drivers.

"I try to be careful but I don't worry what I am doing – if I can't drive by now there's no point in worrying about it! You haven't got to worry about how many cars are trailing back behind you or in front of you – you have only got one car in front of you and one car behind you and you can pretty much jog along, that's the way I look at it."

In almost 50 years of driving Mrs Meredith has only ever had one prang, caused about 10 years ago after another motorist failed to indicate when turning.

As a result she chose to attend a one-to-one driving course rather than have her otherwise spotless licence darkened with a few points. But she says: "It was surprising how many young people were there being shown how to drive."

She only tootles about, but in a rural area like Shropshire where public transport is hit and miss, her little Civic gives her a sense of independence.

"I cannot walk very far, but it's the difference between living and being able to live a normal life or having to be shut in the house and do nothing," she says.

Not that Mrs Meredith lets that happen. Although she has done all of 35,000 miles in the last 12 years, she has a driven through Europe. Around 12 years ago she went on a road trip to Alicanti with a friend. "It is so easy," she days.

And she still has a driver's licence for Qatar, which she used when visiting her brother who worked there. In Qatar, she joined a queue of flip-flopped Bedouins to do her driving test. Her examiner was a woman wearing jackboots who pointed at pictures of road signs with a gun.

Pressure? What pressure. Mrs Meredith, cool as a cucumber, passed the test and hit the streets of Qatar in a Buick.

At 91 years old, Norman Dewis, from Church Stretton, is not only driving, but also racing, his cars.The former chief E-Type Jag test driver, who still drives Jags to this day, has no plans to hang up his leather motoring gloves just yet.

"I am still driving on the race tracks – I am at Goodwood Festival of Speed this year again – and I've got three trips to the States, including the Monterey race in August."

Indeed, he scored the fastest lap last year at Goodwood, and he was not even trying.

Norman began driving in 1937 when he passed his test on a motorcycle. "I never had a car test," he says. "I passed for the motorbike and it automatically put me in the grade for a car."

He also holds the world record for the number of miles on a test track – one and a quarter million miles. But driving on the roads is another matter, says Norman, who still drives every day and sees no reason to stop.

"I think that generally there is little pleasure in driving on the roads these days. Sometimes you get a good run but it is usually stop-start," he says

"In the old days, you used to be able to go for miles and not see another car, and you can still actually can in some parts of Shropshire.

"But the accident rate has become pretty high, and those involved are often young kids. They have got to get more experience."

"People are living longer and we have to accept that if they keep healthy there is no reason why they cannot drive."You get more and more experienced over the years and it's silly to say you cannot keep it up – I am on the road all the time, putting a few miles in."