Safe Speed Forums

I was glancing through Motoring section of yesterday's Daily Telegraph and quite by accident this article caught my attention.

Quote:
Despite these safety improvements, new speed trap legislation will soon make driving one mph over the limit a statutory offence, adds Michael Kemp.




Well! I gotta tell you, My mouth dropped open when I first read this a couple hours ago, and I'm still franky speechless!

If this actually happens, my house will be on the market and I'll be outta this country for good. I'll go pick coconuts! Anything! I wont contribute to a country which treats its people like this. Thank God I don't have a family to support here.

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Living in the UK is like eating a bile sandwich. It leaves a bitter taste in yer mouth

I wish I did get commission - especially after our last fruitful couple of months up here ....

We are not all about nicking and enforcing a law you know - we work towards protecting people - and if we can just get people to look at their driving practices and take note - even just a little more - then some progress is made.

Long hard battle and we will just have to keep chipping away at it. would help if the Scam Partnerships would do more than just preach one message though... We can conquer the speed issue if we emphasised the key chore elements of safe driving - namely COAST - and this actually helps and enables correct and legal speed to be chosen by and large ....

But - long battle as you say above...of course we will be thinking of other commitments and get side tracked by sight of a pretty girl, a work problem which you "resolve in your head on the way home", planning the evening meal etc...

But - strongly recommend that you try to concentrate more on the drive and feel of your car, enjoy the drive. Read Road Craft, re-read the HC, go on a track day , skid and brake course- that will wake you up - and wake up your concentration skills - and you get to drive at a fast speed without fear of a ping!

Would bet that you are heck of a lot more relaxed and concentrating on your drive - for sheer pleasure of a good drive - after that!

What sort of loonies crash just because they are travellig too fast?
I'm guessing folks travelling far in excess of the posted limit like boy racers, folks on the run from the law, and idiots that dont have the basic skillset of adjusting their speed for the conditions. None of which are middle English tax payers on their way to work, who are probably exceeding a ridiculously low limit by a small margin, yet getting hit in the wallet and the licence.

I think we can all except that some loony going way to fast is a (possible) danger on the roads, but the average driver is such a loony, although none less a criminal by all accounts.

Like I said! It's not a road safety issue at all. It's just yet another way to shaft decent ordinary people like ourselves into paying more and more taxes

The hypocricy of the the people who run this country knows no bounds. It doesn't matter who the politicians are or from which side of the political spectrum they come from.

Our country is basically a huge 'business'. But instead of it's citizens being employees of this 'company', people with a vested interest in the well being of the enterprise, we have become unwilling victims of a state which exploits the prosperity of its people for its own ends.

Thus it pursues policies like the one being discussed on this website. It makes spurious claims about how many lives are being saved knowing full well that it is creaming millions of pounds from people. It restricts peoples' freedoms in pursuit of policies that just wont work. How many millions of pounds will the government steal off motorists in pursuit of an ideal where nobody dies on our roads? What price in money and loss of civil liberties will it take to save a few hundred lives a year? It's a fantasy. It will never happen AND THEY know it wont happen. And in the meanwhile, we all drive around tring to eek out an existence, our eyes glued to our speedometers and looking in the bushes at the side of the road and above the road bridges for the revenue thieves. What a society. It's just monstrous.

And if the politicians were really SO concerned about the safety and well being of its citizens, there's plenty they could do to save lives aren't there? They could ban tobacco for a start. That kills over 100,000 people a year we are told. BUT of course the poor plebs enslaved by their nicotine addiction also cough up (literally) vast sums of revenue for the government. Doesn't make any difference when you get lung cancer though, Despite the fact you've paid so much more for your cancer than anyone else in the world over your lifetime as a smoker, don't expect a hospital bed to be automatically available when yer lungs finally pack up.

And then there's the motor industry itself. Haven't they got something to answer for too? The average family saloon will quite happily poodle along at 110-120mph. If yer wealthy enough (and stupid enough) you can buy a car or a motorcycle that'll nudge 200mph. Have you noticed any government here coercing the motor industry to show any responsibility for death and destruction their product causes? ................Yeah! Exactly

Welcome to the modern democracy peeps. Put a tick in a box once every 5 years and just watch your freedom and your money disappear.

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Living in the UK is like eating a bile sandwich. It leaves a bitter taste in yer mouth

The sort who are driving too fast and did not observe nor anticipate the other person getting in the way because their speed was so far in excess that they could not brake in time.... but we are back to the contributory factor relating to severity of outcome rather than actual cause - which was due to inattention - and some of the inattention was the heavy foot! which led to the excessive speed ....

[politically correct mode on ]




True - and good many of the silly little boy racers are traceable via NIP process.. As for the folk on run from law - at least you could say we got an angle on the stolen car - or at least retrieved £60 from Mr Big Time Criminal - who may have robbed a bank - but had the decency to register his car first




Not going to say what our tolerance actually is - else you will all start zooming through here - and upset Soren again ...

But let us just say - we give a very fair margin - our patch is not too PeeCee Plod - and if you get a speeding ticket from the mobile teams - you will definitely have been pushing your luck here ... definite speeding - we do't do the blips... and we can tell ....

Unlike other areas we read of as constant - we definitely do not seek to entrap or treat people unfairly - whether in person or by the mobile units. We are not a Pratnership place either .... but we do have an obligation to our employers - the people who live here - to give value for money, protect them and enforce the laws with a common sense approach.

I agree that policing and politics should remain separate. Read MM's posting on the Lord Woolf speech.

Sir Ian Blair (no relation to Tone) is in line to replace Sir John Stevens. No secret that he is very much pro- New Labour - and although I wil acknowledge that I agree with him on some issues regarding equality and merit - I do disagree with him on others. I also worry that personal politics may cloud certain issues.




My cousin (MM's wife - aka Wildy Cat = posts a lot on the PH site ) often cites one of her fave plays by Jean Paul Sartre "Dirty Hands" but known in English as "Crime Passionel" . About a politician who was murdered - and the spectator is left to consider whether Hugo (the "hero") killed him for having sex with his wife or for the "cause". However, the politician told Hugo (before he pulled the triigger) that no politician can avoid spin and getting his hands "dirty" as a means to an end. Written in the 40s and still apt.... (Have seen this play - was at our local Uni theatre some time ago... BiBs are well educated and cultured - you know! My cousin is right - gripping play!)





We would all like to see zero deaths - but we know it will not necessarily happen. I happen to agree that a speed camera does not resolve that much . Used effectively - can be a useful tool - but no more than that...




Life's pleasures - always highly taxed....But spending on police, NHS (providing decent medicines, chemo, actually cleeaning those wards ....costs money and people pay death duties .....

Nowt so certain as death and taxes is there mate ......

As for the rest - mate - agree technology does appear to have overtaken our abilty to use it... responsibly ...

A pearl of wisdom if ever there was one..

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Speed camera policy Kills