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Police Chief "Out of Touch with Reality" on Road Policing
Meredyth Hughes (Head of Road Policing for the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO)) claimed that the ABD have "encouraged drivers to believe that there is something inherently wrong with enforcing the law" (Times article 23 May).
Hughes was announcing attempts to counter the increasing determination of the British motorist to fight speeding tickets through the courts - something that has been happening with more and more success as a groundswell of opinion has swung against speed cameras.
The ABD supports the enforcement of sensible laws against people who are causing danger to themselves and others. What is "inherently wrong" is the creation of bad laws which criminalise reasonable behaviour - laws which only exist because they can be enforced automatically.
ABD Chairman Brian Gregory said "Once again, ACPO have shown that they fail to understand what law enforcement is for in a democracy. Even the camera partnerships do not dare claim that laws should be enforced purely for their own sake - it's supposed to be justified by safety. It's supposed to have reasoning behind it. But it doesn't, and that's why people are fighting speed camera tickets with everything they have."
ABD speed limit expert Malcolm Heymer said: "The problem with speed limits is that exceeding them is an absolute offence --- drivers are unable to defend themselves by pointing out that either the speed limit is wrong for the road, or that the speed was not in any way dangerous to anyone at the time of the offence. The police therefore need to use their discretion about how they enforce the law - excessive, heavy handed enforcement has and will undermine it."
Speed limits should be used by the police as a simple means of prosecuting drivers who are driving in a dangerous manner. This is because it is very difficult to prove that something is dangerous, whereas proving something is over a given speed is very easy. Speed therefore provides a simple means for the police to prosecute dangerous drivers.
This is what used to happen before speed cameras were introduced. A time when properly trained police traffic officers used their discretion to apply the law to those in need of it.
The concept of not rigidly enforcing speed limits was understood as long ago as 1922, when the Chief Constable of the Birmingham Police Force addressed a meeting of the Midland Car Club, and was reported by the Birmingham Post thus:
"A new Motor-car Act was coming along as well. The Act of 1903 was out of date. the section limiting speed to 20 miles was to be abolished. There was to be no speed limit, for to put the limit at say 20 miles suggested to some motorists that that was the speed at which they were habitually at liberty to travel. In Birmingham he could say now that the old Act was likely to come to an end, they had never laid a speed trap. When the 1903 Act became law he issued instructions to the police that they were not to prosecute persons under the speed limit section, but to rely entirely on the first section dealing with driving to the common danger."
This concept continued through to the 1990's, during which period Britain's traffic police had the highest reputation in the world, and were respected by the vast majority of the public.
Unfortunately, under the stewardship of Meredyth Hughes, and his predecessor, Richard Brunstrom, the police have now totally lost the plot on road policing. They now prosecute anybody over a speed limit even when they are driving in a manner that cannot remotely be considered dangerous. They have become obsessed with the letter of the law rather than the spirit of the law, and are enforcing speed limits for their own sake, rather than for road safety reasons.
Many police traffic officers have disappeared from our roads, and we are left with moronic machines that throw speeding fines at all and sundry with wanton disregard for driving skills, road safety, and police credibility.
ABD spokesman Nigel Humphries said: "Many drivers now have an instinctively negative response when they see a police vehicle on the roads. They no longer see them as a friend who will protect them against dangerous drivers and criminals, but as an enemy that is out to get them. They are raising their children to think the same."
Brian Gregory concluded: "I regret to say that Hughes' comments show that the police no longer police Britain's roads with the consent of the public."
Highly visible cameras
Work is being carried out to make sure that all roadside safety cameras in Avon and Somerset are clearly visible to drivers.
The Safety Camera Partnership, working with its local authority partners, wants to ensure that none of the fixed cameras is obscured by trees or bushes which have grown up in recent months.
Workmen are trimming back foliage so the yellow-painted cameras can be easily seen by road users.
Superintendent Andy Pullen, head of the Road Policing Unit of Avon and Somerset Police - one of the partners in the Safety Camera Partnership - said: “These roadside cameras were installed to deter drivers from driving too fast on stretches of road where there have been injury collisions in the past so it is important that drivers can see the cameras well in advance so they can adjust their speed if necessary.
“We don’t want to prosecute drivers. We want them to keep within speed limits. This will reduce the risk of a collision in which they, their passengers or other road users could be killed or seriously injured.”
Supt Pullen said the public could help by reporting any camera which was obscured by foliage to the partnership on 01823 423430.
The strict rules on the use of safety cameras have recently been relaxed by the Government with the launch of the new road safety partnerships.
But the Safety Camera Partnership for Avon and Somerset says it will continue to operate under the old guidelines and has no intention of using “hidden” cameras.
Fixed camera housings will continue to be painted bright reflective yellow and will be visible to a driver from at least 60 metres where the speed limit is 40mph or less, and 100 metres in areas with higher speed limits.
Mobile camera vehicles will be distinctively marked to make them conspicuous to drivers.
The areas in which cameras operate – both fixed and mobile – are clearly signed in advance with the familiar black and white camera silhouette signs.
There are 68 fixed roadside cameras and Avon and Somerset, with mobile cameras being used at another 183 locations.
Cameras have also been installed at 42 busy road junctions to deter drivers from “jumping” red lights.
During the past four years there has been a 24 per cent reduction in the number of casualties on roads covered by cameras.
Further information about the location of cameras with maps and the collision history, can be seen on the Safety Camera Partnership’s website - www.safecam.org.uk
Too many defective speeding prosecutions - so ACPO bluff harder
According to the Times, The Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO)will send a crack defence team to prosecute drivers who dare to challenge their speeding fine.
Safe Speed says that ACPO is merely upping their bluff. The biggest bluff of all is that the resources do not exist to prosecute every speeding case. If drivers stopped accepting fixed penalties the system would collapse in weeks. This is the real reason for the ever increasing 'bluff and bluster' tactics -they need to force us into paying fixed penalties because neither the courts nor the CPS can possibly cope with much of an increase in cases.
Paul Smith, of SafeSpeed.org.uk, said: "This action by ACPO is a dirty trick - they are attempting to put access to justice beyond the pocket of ordinary drivers. They are effectively saying - 'you are guilty because we never make mistakes'. But the newspapers are full of Police mistakes, and, to make matters worse, one of the key pieces of police prosecution equipment is downright dodgy. So dodgy, in fact, that it has been christened the 'dodgyscope' by Internet users."
According to The Times {verbatim quote}:
{Mr Hughes said: "I respect competent lawyers who go through the evidence on behalf of their client. My job is to make sure the prosecution case is as robust as the defence."
He criticised anti-camera groups such as Safe Speed and the Association of British Drivers, which encourage drivers to challenge speeding tickets.
"What these groups have done is encourage people to believe that there is something inherently wrong with enforcing the law."}
Paul Smith replied: "What is wrong, Mr Hughes, is the overzealous application of a law that simply isn't up to the job. You are damaging confidence in the justice system, the Police / public relationship and road safety itself. You can't even comply with the speed limit yourself, because you recently had 6 driving licence points for speeding."
"We encourage drivers to investigate the case against them. I would go as far as to say that MOST speeding cases are DEFECTIVE on the prosecution side. If you dig deep enough a fatal defect is quite likely to emerge. If you know you were not speeding according to law, or you do not know who the driver was at the time of the alleged offence then you are likely to have a winnable case."
"The whole thing has become a petty war of technicalities with ACPO and the Police throwing ever increasing resources against an increasingly untrusting public. In this ridiculous war road safety has been forgotten. Mr Hughes may well claim that the law is on his side but however much he may bleat about the
law the fact is that millions upon millions of speeding prosecutions are not saving lives on the road. It isn't 'the law' that matters most here, Mr Hughes, it's the number of roads fatalities. You should know better."
Motorist's Prosecution Checklist:
* The speed limit must be correctly signed in accordance with the regulations
(Folly Bottom, Wylye, North Wales, Cleveland, Starcross and others)
* A speed limit order must apply correctly to the location in question.
(Lincolnshire, London, North Wales and others)
* The paperwork must be correct and in accordance with all laws and
regulations. (Dorset, Cleveland)
* The paperwork must be delivered on time
* The Notice of Intended Prosecution (NIP) cannot be served by second class
post. (South Wales)
* Papers to issue a summons must be laid within 6 months of the date of alleged
offence.
* The equipment must be calibrated correctly.
* The operator must use the equipment in accordance with rules and guidelines.
* The operator must form a prior opinion of speed in excess of a speed limit.
* Arguably only a Police constable is qualified to form a prior opinion of
speed in excess of a posted speed limit.
* Communications equipment must be switched off while measurements of speed are
taken (including the operator's mobile phone).
* The site must be suitable (restrictions include near power lines)
* The equipment must be working properly.
* Evidence must be disclosed to the defence 7 days before the trial on request or it becomes inadmissible.
* If you don't know who the driver was at the time of the alleged offence you may well have a statutory defence in RTOA1988 S172(4) as amended
* The court must be impartial (And since the Magistrate's Court Service are usually a camera partnership member it is far from clear that the court has the required degree of impartiality.)
* The process must not breach your Human Rights (A 'right to silence' case is ongoing awaiting verdict at the ECHR at Strasbourg.)
* In the case of Gatso fixed speed cameras the transit of the calibration marks in the two photographs must match the speed recorded by the radar speed meter.
* The prosecution must turn up in court with the correct paperwork.
* Witness statements cannot be signed by machine. (North Wales)
* The LTI20.20 (common laser speed meter used in virtually all mobile speed camera vans) is subject to various operating anomalies, notably 'slip effect'.
A failure in any of these areas will usually be fatal to a prosecution case.
The Times today: http://tinyurl.com/2eytvl
Safe Speed's 'Scrap Speed Cameras Week' launched on Sunday 24th June
Let's have the facts out on the table.
- Road deaths haven't fallen as expected
- Road crash hospitalisations haven't fallen for a decade
- Speed camera benefit claims are dominated by a statistical blip
- Speeding is endemic, yet only 5% of injury crashes involve ANY speeding vehicle
- Speed cameras come with a vast catalogue of adverse side effects.
- Department for Transport cancelled their side effects research
- The word 'speed' is used officially with multiple overlapping meanings and has clouded the thinking and the debate
- Driving too fast is dangerous, but that's not the same as exceeding a speed limit
- Driver quality is the foundation of all road safety - but DfT policies are making it worse.
- Road safety isn't mainly about physics. It's mainly about road user psychology.
Paul Smith, of SafeSpeed.org.uk, said: "We've launched 'Scrap Speed Cameras Week' for one reason and one reason only. Speed cameras are making road safety worse. We absolutely must get rid of them to refocus road safety efforts on the things that matter - not the things that are easy to measure."
"Speed cameras have only been supported by dodgy statistics, wishful thinking and false assumptions. They have failed to make our roads safer and now they must go."
"I'm 100% confident that any proper examination of the facts will be forced to conclude that speed cameras have made our roads more dangerous."
"Speed cameras. We hate them. They don't work to make the roads safer, and they have to go."
Dodgy and discredited statistics in response to 'scrapcam' petition
Downing Street has trotted out some dodgy and discredited statistics in response to the 28,000 signatories of the famous 'scrap speed cameras' petition which closed on Tuesday.
The response from the Prime Minister's office in full with Safe Speed comments inserted and marked with a '*'.
Thank you for taking the time to register your views about safety cameras on the Number 10 web site.
Speeding kills. It is a contributory factor in 26% of all fatal accidents in Great Britain.
No it isn't. According to Department for Transport figures exceeding a speed limit it is a contributory factor in 12% of fatal crashes. We know that many of those are caused by reckless and 'abnormal' driver behaviour.
The facts are stark. If a child pedestrian is hit at 30mph they stand an 80% chance of surviving. But if they are hit at 40mph they stand an 80% chance of dying. That is why the Government is committed to achieving appropriate vehicle speeds on the roads as part of its integrated road safety strategy.
* The true facts are more encouraging. In 2005 in built up areas (20, 30 and 40 mph speed limits) 11,000 child pedestrians were injured out of which 47 were killed. 0.42% were killed. So clearly we're not running into them at 'speed limit' speeds because at 30mph we would have killed 2,200. The claim is grossly misleading. [2]
We are succeeding in changing attitudes, and in making drivers realise that one of their responsibilities is to comply with speed limits. The proportion of car drivers who comply with the 30mph limit has greatly increased over the last few years.
* Hardly greatly - and the means of gathering the information changed in the year when the biggest fall was recorded - but that's NO HELP AT ALL when road deaths aren't falling significantly. We don't need more compliance - it's a false objective. We need safer roads. And we aren't getting them.
Safety cameras provide a valuable and cost-effective method of preventing, detecting and enforcing speed and traffic light offences. Their use is based on solid evidence. All reliable research from around the world clearly demonstrates that cameras reduce speeds and save lives.
* Solid evidence? I'm afraid not. The 'evidence' is dominated by statistical errors and a total failure to consider the side effects of the policy.
Independent research (new window), published in December 2005, shows that safety cameras had saved around 1,745 people from being killed or seriously injured, and had prevented around 4,230 personal injury collisions on Britain's roads each year.
* That very same report reveals - buried in appendix h - that 'regression to mean effect' accounts for a full three quarters of the benefit claimed. To make the claim while ignoring the know error is nothing less than a FRAUD.
And while they are saving lives, safety cameras will remain a key part of our road safety strategy.
* They aren't saving lives. That's why they must go. That's why 28,000 signed.
Dodgy statistics won't save lives. The Prime Minister's office needs to do far far better than this.
Official response: http://www.pm.gov.uk/output/Page12127.asp
[1] http://tinyurl.com/2wfs7m See table 6.
[2] http://tinyurl.com/2qxg5p
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