Speed Cameras
Speed camera's proliferate across our land as a revenue raising exercise, under the guise of 'road safety.' Yet these devices, far from reducing accidents are actually more likely to cause them and generally it is not the 'boy racers' that are caught but the ordinary, normally law abiding drivers who inadvertently stray a few mph over the limit. Des O'Connor is just three points away from a driving ban after receiving three speeding tickets in six months after a proliferation of cameras on the Buckinghamshire roads near his home. Yet until now he has driven for 42 years without a blemish on his licence. Also it is claimed that over 1,000 magistrates have been caught speeding by the cameras. Yet the 'boy racer' types make it their business to know exactly where the cameras are by employing simple GPS devices in their cars which beep as they approach the position of a camera. This device can be kept up to date by downloading a new database from the manufacturers site on the internet.
Even the retired Chief Constable who was responsible for introducing the cameras in the first place considers that they are now just used to hound drivers and make money. Peter Joslin says that while he is obviously not against them if they are positioned where they will prevent accidents, he feels there are now too many on the roads and more are not necessary. The Police also place an over reliance on cameras and have drastically reduced the number of 'traffic' cars that go on patrol. This means that there are LESS officers on the road patrolling that are likely to catch those driving without insurance, driving dangerous vehicles or driving whilst being drunk.
In the clamour to raise more cash, many of these cameras are actually sited illegally. The boss of the Norfolk scheme, Barry Parnell quit after police investigated the sites of the county's cameras and criticised the interpretation of the data used to site 15 fixed cameras and many of the 72 mobile sites.
Traffic researchers also point out that only 1 in 8 car crashes is actually caused by driving above the speed limit. Most are caused by driver inattention (keeping a close eye on the speedometer or looking out for cameras?) and by the failure to judge the speed and path of other vehicles. Speed camera partnerships have also been accused of ‘sexing up’ statistics to raise more cash.
The charge was made after one such body was criticised for wrongly claiming a quarter of road deaths are caused by drivers breaking the limit.
The Advertising Standards Authority said the London Safety Camera Partnership’s claim was misleading and could not be justified by fatal accident
statistics.
Motoring groups said the adjudication proved that cash for-camera partnerships were ‘sexing up’ statistics to justify their existence and increase
revenue. ABD spokesman Mark McArthur Christie said: ‘The partnerships sex-up their figures and spin them to suit their argument.’
Paul Smith, of the Safe Speed campaign group, said: ‘Definitions about excessive and inappropriate speed are hazy. ‘But it’s good to see the truth finally coming out. Road safety depends on true and accurate figures.’
Police in the province of Ontario in Canada removed their cameras completely in 1995 and increased police patrols on the road instead. Their death toll has dropped from 999 in 1995 when the cameras went and now is only 881 per year. A spokesman for the Canadian Government said that cameras did nothing to deter the real dangers facing road users which were drunk and drugged drivers, tailgaters and those driving cars with serious mechanical defects. The chance of being stopped by a police patrol was a better deterrent.
Unfortunately the evidence has been ignored by our government and our police who plan to put even more cameras on our roads and now up to twelve miles from the accident black spots rather than the three mile limit now. Yet last year as the cameras issued three million speeding tickets raising about £180,000,000, the number of road deaths actually increased to 3,508.
In 2008, Swindon Council was the first council to vote to remove speed cameras from their town although at the time of writing this has not happened yet.
This subject qualifies for inclusion under my definition of political correctness.
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