Safe Speed Forums

The Times, 5 June 2007,

http://driving.timesonline.co.uk/tol/li ... 884306.ece

Police chief calls for return of hidden speed cameras

Ben Webster, Transport Correspondent

Motorists face the return of hidden speed cameras after Britain’s top traffic policeman said that more lives would be saved if drivers were unable to predict where they could be caught.

Med Hughes, Chief Constable of South Yorkshire and head of roads policing at the Association of Chief Police Officers, has opened the way for forces to stop painting cameras yellow or informing drivers where they will be using mobile camera vans.

In an interview with The Times, he said: “I have always thought it strange that speed cameras were so easily identified. We need to think about whether greater compliance will be delivered by using technology in a less conspicuous way. I might put up Neighbourhood Watch signs but I don’t tell burglars when I am specifically running an anticrime operation.”

Mr Hughes believes that road deaths are not falling fast enough partly because too many drivers slow down only briefly as they pass cameras. He wants camera partnerships, run by police and councils, to take advantage of a change in the way that cameras are funded.

Until April, partnerships were allowed to keep a proportion of speeding fines. In return, they had to abide by a set of rules, including a requirement for cameras to be conspicuous and clearly signposted.

The Government changed the system after protests that police had a financial incentive to catch drivers. The partnerships now receive a fixed grant but they are no longer bound by the rules that stated that “camera housings must be coloured yellow” and be visible from 60 metres (197ft) on a road with a 40mph limit or less and 100 metres on other roads.

The rules also required partnerships to publicise the location of mobile cameras. Mr Hughes said: “The money is no longer linked to the rules and therefore we no longer have to abide by those rules. When you do get hit by hidden cameras you can blame those people who said cameras were cash generators.”

The partnership in North Wales, where Richard Brunstrom is Chief Constable, has already stopped publishing details of where it is carrying out speed enforcement. Inspector Essi Ahari said: “We will be enforcing anywhere and all the time, including using better lenses to operate at night.”

Another rule that has ceased to apply had required partnerships to focus almost all their enforcement on roads where there had been several deaths or serious injuries.

North Wales and Cumbria now focus on roads which they believe to be dangerous but where there have been no serious crashes.

Inspector Ahari said: “We used to have to say to schools that we could not enforce because no one had died yet. Now we can go and deal with the problem before the deaths happen.”

Andrew Howard, head of road safety at the AA, said that it would oppose hiding all speed cameras but would support trials in which signs were put up on certain routes telling drivers that hidden cameras were operating.

What he said

“ I find it weird that there is this idea that enforcing speeding law is somehow unsporting”

“ We need to discuss raising speed limits when people get used to adhering to the current ones”

“ We should be teaching 10 and 11-year-olds about their responsibilities when driving a car, not just how to be a safe pedestrian or cyclist”

“ Speed cameras have released officers for other duties by automating the enforcement process. They are like burglar alarms, which are just older and more accepted”

“ Reducing the drink-drive limit from 80mg to 50mg would make a valuable public statement that it’s impossible to have even one drink and be certain you would pass a breathalyser test”

Safe Speed issued the following PR at 01:57 this morning:

PR496: Speed Cameras: hidden danger

news: for immediate release

The Times today [1] reports that roads policing chief Meredydd Hughes calls for
a return to hidden speed cameras.

Paul Smith, founder of SafeSpeed.org.uk, said: "Speed camera policy has failed
catastrophically to make our roads safer. It's no surprise to me because I've
been examining the overall road safety effects of speed cameras and modern
policy since 2001. The problem is that speed cameras come with adverse side
effects. Hiding the cameras will simply make the side effects worse."

"Speed cameras make no sense. They cannot distinguish between safe and
dangerous behaviours. You can't measure safe driving in miles per hour."

"Meredydd Hughes should know far better than this. Rather than hide speed
cameras, he should be calling for them to be scrapped. It's a case of 'the cure
is worse than the disease'."

"Scrapping speed cameras is now absolutely inevitable. It's only a question of
time. The sooner we scrap them the better. People are dying of bad policy."

"There's one certain consequence of hiding speed cameras, Mr Hughes, and that's
more dead people. Don't do it."

<ends>

Notes for editors
=================

[1] Times article:
http://driving.timesonline.co.uk/tol/li ... 884306.ece

[2] Safe Speed report into speed camera side effects:
http://www.safespeed.org.uk/sideeffects.pdf

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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

daily mail
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/a ... rtComments

_________________
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

Those rules were used by the home office scientific development branch to type appreove the cameras. When those rules are broken then type approval is broken. I am specificly thinking of distance from the carriageway, and the angle from an over bridge.

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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

He's really talking about the rules of the hypothecation scheme, not Home Office or ACPO rules.

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

So is he one of those people who believe that if people are doing 40 in a 30 limit, they'll do 50 if the limit is raised to 40?



Good idea.



Except I rarely see officers enforcing other bad driving.



Another perfect way to criminalise safe motorists, just like with speed limit cuts. For most people one drink has no effect driving, and at most, relaxes you slightly. What about better enforcement of existing rules?

Medd you are a disgrace to your fatherland.

But at least you have made the tacit admission that you were following rules that you didn't agree with because you got paid to do so!!! Police forces could have opted out of partnerships and kept covert cameras but chose not to!! You didn't believe that cameras should be covert when you weren't being paid!

You and your profession prostituted yourselves and now your cash cow has been taken away you are reacting with venom and spite.

You are unfit for high office. You have exposed yourself as a hypocrite!

I love the claim that speed cameras free up police time to deal with other things. The reality is they do nothing of the sort. Instead they create entirely new additional offences, to add to the ones already being detected by non-camera means. Thats right!They do not subtract, they add! What planet's he on?

This is just grasping at straws. The scamera enforcement isn't working as hoped, so they blame it on hypothcation and visible scameras, and move the goalposts to catch more people, reset the stats, and force us to potentially wait years for sufficient data to show that they still aren't working!



'Better lenses'? Is he suggesting using image intensifying lenses on scams? Would this not breach type approval? Is the high cost going to show value to the taxpayer by actually saving some lives?

O'l Merydydydydydyd Hughes also had something to say in the local paper.

http://www.thestar.co.uk/news?articleid=2930428



Mark

He says that NOW he can use hidden cameras and it will reduce the death toll ? The truth is he could always use hidden cameras its just that the camera partnership couldn't pay for them. This indicates he could have used hidden cameras years ago. If his spoutings are true he is responsible for many deaths. He has cut traffic police and relied on automated enforcement.

Richard

They really make me angry!

Weasle words from a man driven by career over duty.

It would appear that Brunstrom has already implemented this idea in North Wales. We are thinking of staying in a cottage near Barmouth, so I checked the Arrive Alive talivan schedule - mainly to see which roads in the area are targeted. Well it used to show which days each road was targeted (although it never provided any information on where on these roads the talivans might be found). The schedule is blank, and hasn't been updated since at least April. Maybe they can't afford the staff to keep the web site up to date any more.

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Brian

Ubnbelievable, I wish I could fit a Ronald Regan Star Wars Laser to the front of my car that reacts to anything pointed at me

As I did for Cumbria, cancel you holiday in Wales, then write to the Welsh tourist board and the appropriate county council to tell them why.

See Speeding Ticket Holiday in North Wales !!!
http://www.safespeed.org.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?t=5865

Eh?!! Clearly he thinks going 34mph in a 30 limit is as criminal as burglary. Not to mention the fact that no one takes any notice of alarms unless they're louder than the telly, keeping them awake etc. What a stupid analogy.

barkstar

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

If your burglar alarm goes off more than 3 times per year the police ignore it in future. They ignore it because the technology gives false alarms. Can we expect the same from speed camera activations?

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Malcolm W.
The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not represent the views of Safespeed.

A normal domestic burglar alarm draws NO response unless there is additional confirmation , i.e a witness reports seeing someone climb in or a broken window.

The critical difference between burglar alarms and speed cameras is that activation of the former costs the police money while activation of the latter makes them money.

Mr Hughes doesn't seem to see that his use of burglar alarms as a comparison is flawed because they DO NOT "automate the enforcement process".

_________________
Malcolm W.
The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not represent the views of Safespeed.

There is a school of thought that says speed cameras work , because of the sheer number of "offences" detected , hidden cameras would be even more "successful" simply because motorists would get no warning. So they may work , but not in the area they claim, their contribution to road safety is questionable at best as evidenced by Paul's research. But there is now an industry with its jobs to look after so they dress themselves up as safety campaigners in an attempt to avoid being recognised for the revenue collectors they are.