Safe Speed Forums

I just saw a Police Camera Action broadcast earlier this evening on ITV4. I think it was a new one with Alistair stewart doing the introduction and another chap doing the presenting.

It was about seizing and crushings of cars by Police.

The whole tone of the programme was that crushing would make a huge difference to uninsured driving. But they said 2 million uninsured drivers and right at the end they said 50,000 vehicles seized (not crushed) 'in the last year'.

FFS doesn't anyone do basic maths any more? 2m/50,000 = 40! The risk to an average uninsured drivers on their figures was one seizure in 40 years. I despair, I really do.

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Paul Smith
Our scrap speed cameras petition got over 28,000 sigs
The Safe Speed campaign demands a return to intelligent road safety

It has been on before. I remember doing the same mental sum then.

The whole crushing thing- clearly a policy driven by silly spitefulness and a domineering attitude.

The thing is, its ecologically an unsound practice. How can the plastics be separated out once its been squashed into a cube?
It cant, it probably ends up in the atmosphere after they melt it down.

Im not a fan of this whole climate change/warming bolloks but i recognise a bad idea when i see one, and crushing car is a bad one. RECYCLE them, stupid authorities.

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"Safety" Scamera Partnerships;
Profitting from death and misery since 1993.

Believe nothing- Question everything.

I happened to catch this one last night as well.



I agree entirely. With all the talk today of recycling, saving resources, minimizing waste and so on, if the government is going to confiscate cars then surely those which are perfectly sound vehicles should simply be sold on anyway?

I think the whole crushing business is just a scare tactic to show that Big Brother is the boss.

I'm not familiar with the way the process works, but I also have concerns over its legality. As far as I could make out from the show, they seize the vehicle then if the person does not show up with documents in order to reclaim it within 14 days (or however long), it goes into the crusher.

Without a court appearance to establish guilt? That sounds like a forfeiture before conviction to me, which is a clear violation of the Bill of Rights.

I was thinking this a while ago. To me the word "crushing" has a very specific connotation and has been carefully chosen for this reason. It is the language of tyrants and dictators: they do not defeat those who stand up to them, they crush them.

I remember the great Steve Callaghan using this very same word when boasting about how they'd caught one person possibly using a jammer to block their laser gun. It was gleefully described how they'd sent a crack team around hot-foot to the owner's premises, and having located the alleged device it was not "removed" or "confiscated", rather it was "crushed".

I wondered at the time why they felt the need to "crush" a small item of electronic equipment having removed it from its owner. I came to the conclusion that the term was largely metaphoric, intended to convey imagery of an overpowering totalitarian regime stamping on anyone threatening its fragile superiority. Think "Nazi jackboot", as that is the sort of imagery they seem to be trying to convey.

"Seized" is another such word, used where words such as "removed" or "confiscated" would fail to convey a sufficiently violent and oppressive image.

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CSCP Latin for beginners...
Ticketo ergo sum : I scam therefore I am!

Steve Callaghan....nows theres a real ****!

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"Safety" Scamera Partnerships;
Profitting from death and misery since 1993.

Believe nothing- Question everything.

Sorry but not got a problem with this generally, though the cars should be recycled.

Several other 'Cops on the Box' programmes have featured this and though we can only go off the ones shown most of the owners had other problems on top of the no insurance and pretty much all ended up admitting they were uninsured....eventually, having sworn on their mother lives etc. They can sign the vehicle over for immediate disposal and most seem to as they were cheap old cars. Or anyone who has any car third party cover can reclaim it, having paid the fee. In Manchester one man reclaimed 11 cars in a week!! A loop hole that needs closing.

I got pulled recently, everything was checked and cross referenced on the computer, then they asked for my name and DOB. I do actually wonder why it has taken so long for a quickly accessible database of licences, MOTs and insurance to be set up. Before Cops had a right job on there hands, issuing HORT1s like confetti to scrotes who had no intention of producing.

I'm no fan of Big Brother government but given the appallingly high number of car being driven illegally anything that helps the Cops quickly identify those who aren't playing the game is okay by me. I'm not seeing this as BB showing who's boss, they're driving illegally and they know it.

It's a different arguement if they confiscate it because the national insurance database hasn't your details. There's been a case highlighted on the forum in the last few months. But that's an irritating system glitch, that's all.

Barkstar

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The difference between intelligence and stupidity is that intelligence has limits.

Absolutely 100% spot-on. A perceptive exposé of the thinking behind the State in which we live. Ten years ago I would have dismissed this post as hysterical nonsense; now, in 2007, I - unfortunately - know it to be true.

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Save a cow - eat a vegetarian

What phrase wouldn't offend you anti-fascist leanings then? "Your car will have hydraulic pressure applied to compromise its structural integrity, and thus place it beyond use"?

And anyway I'm not so sure those taking the uninsured cars off the road, ie the Cops, actually say 'crushed' anyway.

Barkstar

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The difference between intelligence and stupidity is that intelligence has limits.

The question is, why do the cars automatically have to go to the crusher? If the state is going to seize or confiscate (call it what you like) a vehicle because of some violation of the law, why does that vehicle have to be totally destroyed? Surely the sensible thing to do with forfeited vehicles is to either (a) sell it via the usual government auction type of program if it's worth it or (b) dispose of it through the scrapyards in the usual way. In the latter case the shell might well end up in the crusher at some point anyway, but only after other parts have been stripped and re-used as with any other junked car.

What purpose does completely crushing a perfectly good car intact serve, other than as a demonstration of the state's power?

Got UK 2007 in one

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lets bring sanity back to speed limits.
Drivers are like donkeys -they respond best to a carrot, not a stick .Road safety experts are like Asses - best kept covered up ,or sat on

I've yet to see a 'perfectly good' car crushed following seizure - Do you have any documented examples (That aren't database/paperwork cock-ups)?

If a car is seized it can be reclaimed, after paying a fee, and I should think the valuable ones are reclaimed. And though we might see cars being crushed, can you be sure they were seized vehicles or just suitable ones to hand at the scrap yard. And seeing as an lot of worn out cars are dealt with this way are you getting as hopping mad about these as well or just the seized ones? Because that wouldn't make sense.

I don't know how the cars are disposed of, and I don't think you do either. The seized cars are handled by contractors who are tasked with their disposal if they aren't claimed. So I think if they had a car handed to them that is worth a lot more as salvage than as a cube of mixed scrap what do you think they might do with it?

But all of this is getting away from the simple fact that these cars are seized because the driver hasn't insurance and/or a driving licence. What other way of dealing with it is there?

Barkstar

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The difference between intelligence and stupidity is that intelligence has limits.

what about this £30,000 cock-up

What happens of my tr4 gets nicked and found, will they crush it rather than try and find the owner?

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Speed limit sign radio interview. TV Snap Unhappy
“It has never been the rule in this country – I hope it never will be - that suspected criminal offences must automatically be the subject of prosecution” He added that there should be a prosecution: “wherever it appears that the offence or the circumstances of its commission is or are of such a character that a prosecution in respect thereof is required in the public interest”
This approach has been endorsed by Attorney General ever since 1951. CPS Code

As I said, I don't know the full procedure involved. I'm just going by what was implied, that vehicles unclaimed after so long are automatically crushed. Of course, the media has been known to get things wrong from time to time!





As a lover of classic cars myself that story makes me both sad and mad as hell at Lambeth Council. If that had been me, I'd have been straight down to the police station and the court to file both a lawsuit against them for the full value plus all costs, and charges of theft and criminal damage.

Up here in nice reasonable Durham - we've been crushing uninsured cars for quite some time. Car has to be seriously defective. We decontaminate it and crush it as cleanly as possible


We do this because if we sent these cars to auction - they would sold again for under £100 and end up back on the road again


If we confiscate and take to the pound to give the owner a chance for his bank to honour his direct debit to his inusrers (does happen) - we'll keep the car accruing storage charges for around 6 months and then we have little choice but to treat as "abandoned vehicle" if we don't hear anything further from the owner/keeper of the car. At which point - if the vehicle is sound and viable - we will send it to a car auction where dealers will often buy the decent ones to sell on properly.


I think by and large - we are starting to get the upper hand over the uninsured here as each car in our fleet have all the tools and doo-dahs on board - and they are out and about.

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I guess if nobody has tried to claim a vehicle within 6 months then it's reasonable to assume it's been abandoned, but I'm still rather concerned about other cases in general.

Do the police go to a court of law and obtain a conviction before destroying or otherwise disposing of confiscated vehicles?

I think it would be useful to know what happens in cases where the Police are mistaken when seizing a vehicle, or act out of malice, (yes it does happen with individual officers, I am sure !).

There seem to have been too many cases in the press where the owner still has to pay to release the vehicle and receives no recompense at all, or enve his money back. In my view the Police should refund all moneys taken in such cases. Are there any lawyers looking at this forum ? Maybe they could let us know the legal position on illegal seizures.

However, no doubt the money is too good for such a thing to happen. Silly me for thinking otherwise !

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Good manners maketh a good motorist