A study has found that car insurance could be a lot cheaper in low crime areas than in places that the rate of crime is high.

The study also found that while motorists in the south-west of the country pay about £569 a year, their counterparts in Scotland pay up to £580 annually.

But experts say motorists who pay higher premiums because they live in high crime areas could reduce their car insurance cost by shopping around for cheaper and, possibly, the best deals.

Meanwhile, it has been found that insurers in the US, in a bid to boost business, are wooing teenage drivers.

Young male drivers have had to pay higher premiums for their car insurance because insurers regard them as high risk customers.

But growing competition among insurance companies is fast changing the rule, as they now overlook the risk teenage motorists constitute and are now signing them up. And they no longer constitute as much risk as they used to.