A young driver in Melbourne has been snapped literally in cruise control – driving down a highway with his feet casually hanging of his driver’s side window.

A motorist took this shocking photo of the young P Plate driver heading down the Eastern Freeway at around 7am on Monday morning.

The driver, Stewart, told News Ltd the young man was also speeding, and pulled his feet back into the car before the Eastlink tunnel.

The dangerous behaviour comes as the national Christmas road toll climbs to 12.

Two people were killed this morning on NSW roads in separate accidents within minutes of each other.

Police said a man died in a two-car collision at Marsden Park in Sydney's north-west on Wednesday morning, with the accident reported at 6.49am (AEDT).

A driver heading down the Eastern Freeway with his feet hanging out the window.

The driver of the other car was taken to hospital suffering from shock.

At 6.58am police received a report that a man was killed when the four-wheel-drive vehicle he was in rolled on the Hume Highway about 30km north of Holbrook in NSW's south.

NSW's first holiday period fatality was a 79-year-old woman in a car crash at Mount Ousley, south of Sydney, just after 1pm on Sunday.