Police to net an extra £12 million from speed awareness courses

More than a million drivers each year now opt to attend speeding awareness courses instead of receiving points and a fine

Currently police forces are not supposed to generate and income from the courses but do receive a "flat fee" to cover their costs, because of a £10 per person price rise from last month, they are estimated to receive an extra £12 million a year from speed awareness courses going forwards

With thousands more speed cameras being placed around the country, Police forces have now been accused of deliberately targeting motorists to raise revenue

Hugh Bladon of the Alliance of British Drivers claimed it was clear by the huge numbers taking part, that police forces were generating significant amounts of revenue from the schemes.

He said: "The incentive is clearly there for the police to get people onto these courses because they benefit financially. It does not accord with what our definition of justice is in the UK".

Claire Armstrong of the group Safe Speed, also said it was nonsense to suggest speed awareness courses were about anything but making money.

She said: "These course are using the police as a sales mechanism for the speed camera industry. It is so far from being about road safety that they should be embarrassed.

"Motorists are being bribed into doing these courses that are not improving road safety. It is a huge scam."

Two private companies run the majority of courses, but five police forces; Lancashire, Merseyside, Humberside, Cheshire and Northamptonshire run their own.

Any profits they make, must be put back into road safety, but with forces facing unprecedented financial pressure, any extra revenue will be welcomed by Chief Constables.

For more information around this please read this story in the Telegraph

Drivers caught using phones for first time now face points

Under new government plans drivers in England, Scotland and Wales caught using a mobile phone for the first time will automatically receive penalty points.
Previously, motorists in some police force areas could avoid points by taking a remedial driving course. However ministers believe it is not a tough enough measure to deter people from using a hand-held phone while driving.

They have also confirmed plans to raise fines for offences from £100 to £200 and penalty points from three to six.

The scrapping of the driving course option is among several measures announced in a government response to a consultation on punishments for drivers caught using hand-held phones.
The government first announced that it was going to increase fines and double penalty points in September.

The new measures, which are due to take effect next year, follow the jailing last month of lorry driver Tomasz Kroker, who killed a mother and three children while distracted by his phone.

Fine numbers plummet

The number of fines issued for motorists caught using a mobile phone illegally has plummeted by 84% since 2011.

Some 16,900 drivers were handed fixed-penalty notices in England and Wales last year, compared with 123,100 in 2011, Home Office data shows.

Motoring groups believe the decline is due to a 27% fall in the number of full-time dedicated roads policing officers in England and Wales (excluding London) between 2010 and 2015.

Department for Transport figures show that a driver being impaired or distracted by their phone had been a contributory factor in 440 accidents in Britain last year, including 22 which were fatal and 75 classed as serious.

Steve Gooding, director of motoring research charity the RAC Foundation, said: "By ruling out courses and doubling the fine, ministers are reflecting public concern and showing they want to stamp out a potentially lethal activity before it becomes entrenched behaviour for a growing number of drivers."

The measures will not affect Northern Ireland, where drivers are currently given three penalty points and a £60 fine for the offence.

The Department for Infrastructure has said there are no plans to change this, but it "will continue to monitor changes being made in Britain to see what can be learned".

Source BBC

Roadside 'textalyser' will treat drivers on smartphones like drunks

Police may start using a "textalyser" soon the new gadget will help them gauge if a distracted driver has been using their mobile phone before a road incident.

The move is in response to the rise  of instances of distracted driving that have led to accidents and death.

The idea was proposed by a draft legislation in New York, which would require drivers to submit their phones for testing, if pulled up by authorities.

"Reports indicate that 67 per cent of drivers admit to continued use of their cell phones while driving despite knowledge of the inherent danger to themselves and others on the road," the draft law said.
"Therefore, it is in the state's interest to treat this impairment with a similar methodology to that of drunk driving."

The new law, known as "Evan's Law" is named after 19-year-old Evan Lieberman, who died in a 2011 collision caused by a distracted driver. His father, Ben Lieberman, helped to draft and implement the law through his awareness nonprofit  Distracted Operators Risk Casualties (DORCS).

How the device would work

Obviously, due to privacy laws, police would not be able to force people to unlock their phone to check their recent calls, texts or social media activity.

Instead, the "textalyser" would look at metadata on the phone just to check whether it was used recently or not - keeping conversations, contacts, numbers, photos, and app data private.

Mobile phones are biggest accident risk in the UK

67 people were killed in Britain in the past three years purely because drivers were on their phones - and this doesn't include those who may have just put down their phones or been about to pick them up.

The Department for Transport has said that of 88 deaths caused by distractions in 2012, 17 (or 19pc) were due to mobile use – the highest death rate compared to other in-case causes such as people, children or sat-navs.

For more in depth information please read the article by the Telegraph

Just give me the points and a fine

A driver caught using his mobile phone asked for penalty points and a fine rather than opt for a "boring" course, police have said.

The unnamed motorist stated on a caution form he had completed a driver improvement course the day before.

He wrote: "Just give me the points and fine - I did the mobile phone course yesterday. It was as boring as hell."

Those who commit motoring offences are sometimes offered courses as an alternative to penalties. No details about where the man was stopped have been released.
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The force's road policing team shared a photo of the form on Twitter with the comment: "Some will never learn".

Man jailed for changing number plates after speeding

Kyle Nixon who changed the appearance of his number plates after he was caught speeding on the A1 has been jailed for three months

Mr Nixon was clocked by a static speed camera doing 87mph in a 70 mph limit on the A1 at Great Ponton, near Grantham, on October 2.

Lincoln Crown Court heard Nixon, from Kent, was sent a notice of intended prosecution by Lincolnshire Police as he was the registered keeper of the vehicle caught speeding, a Vauxhall Zafira.

After receiving the speeding notice Nixon telephoned the ticket office and claimed he could not be the driver as he had not been in Lincolnshire for two weeks and asked if there was any pictures of the vehicle and was told to email the ticket office images of his own car.

Mr Bishop said when the ticket office received three images of Nixon's car on October 29 it was clear the appearance of the number plates had changed but not the registration.

Nixon sent the ticket office further close up images of his number plates on November 11 but finally admitted he was the driver three days later.

Siward James-Moore, mitigating, told the court Nixon initially did not realise that his journey had taken him through Lincolnshire.

Mr James-Moore said when Nixon finally realised he was the driver he tried to "wriggle off the hook." Mr James-Moore added: "He was in a hole and kept on digging when he should have put his hands up."

Nixon pleaded guilty to a charge of perverting the course of justice between October 9 and November 14 last year and speeding on October 2.

He was jailed for three months and also received three penalty points on his driving licence.

Passing sentence Recorder Ciaran Rankin told Nixon his actions struck at the heart of the criminal justice system.

Recorder Rankin told him: "Having been caught, what followed was a series of acts of the upmost stupidity."

Taxi Driver Jailed After Claiming 'American Friend' Drove Speeding Cab

Taxi driver Nigel Taylor, from Sherbourne Grove in Birmingham, has been jailed for perverting the course of justice after falsely claiming a friend visiting from America was at the wheel when his cab was caught on camera speeding.

Mr Taylor had claimed he was asleep at home when his private hire vehicle was flashed by a speed camera in Pershore Road in August 2012, he said that a friend from Los Angeles had used the car without his permission.

In light of his information the prosecution was discontinued, however the enquiry was passed to West Midlands Police at the camera enforcement unit who probed the claim with Birmingham licensing enforcement officers. Taylor’s driver records from his taxi base showed that he was working at the time of the speeding offence proving that he had invented the story to avoid points ( he already had seven points on his licence).

Taylor was interviewed and admitted driving the vehicle at the time and was charged with perverting the course of justice after refusing a fixed-penalty ticket. He was jailed for four months at Birmingham Crown Court and ordered to pay £580 costs.

In Case You Missed It

last week Ex-minister Chris Huhne was ordered to pay £77,750 in legal costs

The costs were relating to his prosecution for passing speeding points on to Vicky Pryce his ex-wife (she herself was ordered to pay £49,200) for her part in the crime. It seems to me that this is a very clear message from the government that you are always better just taking the points! Remembering that both parties got jail time as well. To read this story please visit our news page http://www.radar-detectors.co.uk/page/speeding-news#chrishuhne Tags: #chrishuhne #speeding #fined #points #drivinglicence #vivkypryce