Who was at the wheel" case to be heard. 563

Adrian

Allow me to answer that for him Adrian. Paul Smith quite rightly wishes to place the focus back on to driver skills rather than to attempt to measure road safety by numbers. He is in favour of traffic cops pulling people over and pointing out the error of their ways, which I found enormously helpful to my driving standards when I was a yoof. Today, new drivers are being brainwashed into believeing that if they are driving within the arbitary limit, they are driving safely. This is rubbish. The governments promotion of cameras is evil because it is a cash driven initiative masquerading as being in the public interest. It is only in the chancellors interest. Take Kent for example. The Camera Partnerships falsely claim that they have saved hundreds of lives on the roads they are operating on. If this were true, then we could have expected the overall number of rests in Kent to reduce. They have not. They have pretty much remained the same. The reason is that the camera partnership say that because 3 people unusually died on a road between two specific dates, that if nobody dies on that road in the 12 months following a camera being placed there, then that is 3 lives saved. The simple truth is that if a speeding driver is stopped from speeding in onle location, he will simply do it elsewhere. Look at this for example:

"The Scotsman today reports that red light cameras are failing to prevent red light jumping with steady numbers of drivers continuing to jump the lights and trigger the cameras.

Colin McNeill, the manager of the Lothian and Borders Safety Camera Partnership, said: "This is really worrying - we are getting the same number, month in, month out."

Safe Speed points out that this should be no surprise because the cameras cannot address the main causes of red light running. Which are:

Observation failure. A driver did not see the lights. Cameras make no difference because they cannot force drivers with poor observation to see the traffic lights.

Judgement failure. A driver thought he could get through safely before the lights changed. Cameras cannot improve judgement.

Criminals. Someone in a stolen car may recklessly and deliberately drive through red lights but a camera will neither deter nor prevent.

Paul Smith, founder of the Safe Speed road safety campaign (www.safespeed.org.uk) said: "This is depressingly typical of modern road safety policy. Nothing is being thought through properly. A simple logical analysis of the real-world errors that result in red light running soon reveals that cameras are unlikely to make much difference."

"Everyone wants safer roads, but we will not get them until we disband the incompetent partnerships and ditch the useless cameras. We need to refocus road safety policy away from regulation and compliance and back towards skills and atbreastudes."

"British road safety was the best in the world. Now it is insbreastutionally incompetent at the highest level."

Quotes from Paul Smith

Nothing is safe in the Governments hands - Particularly road safety, they simply can't be trusted.

Turk182