Under what law can police offer courses for payment in lieu of judicial process? Speed awareness an idea of ACPO Ltd, with limited companies running courses for profit, we can find no legal authority for any of this. So another chance to earn money for police. Once set up, it then requires offenders to perpetuate and keeps coppers cosily off the streets too. See story here.
Maybe the powerful cycle lobby will join us to stop this profiteering by coercion.
Think you'll find that if someone gets caught doing it again, they don't get the option to go on a course, they just get slapped with a fine and (if a motorist) points on their licence.
ReplyDeleteWell as a matter of fact Mike I know someone who went twice. But even so, the concept has no legal authority and these courses are now making money from all aspects of road life. They're scams.
ReplyDeleteWell not really because they're trying to get the message through to people that driving/riding like a dick will get themselves and/or others killed, too many times(even if I'd only seen it once it would have been too many times) I've come across people using the phone while driving, a few of them have also had their babies/children in the car with them, I've also seen many jumping red lights, more so than cyclists, a handful being "professional" drivers, a few of which were bus drivers, I've also seen MANY who enter the bike boxes at traffic lights, despite being able to stop at the first line, long after the lights have gone red, which means they technically jumped the lights ad could therefore get a £100 fine and 3 points on their licence, not to mention all the times I've had to drop the anchors because some ass decided that they wouldn't give way to me on a roundabout or thought turning left while overtaking was a good idea causing me to take avoiding action, both of which are punishable offences, I also get tailgated quite often, despite usually holding a good speed of 20mph or more, I've also seen quite a few motorists speeding too, one was a motorcycle accelerating to 100+ on a 30mph road and another was a car accelerating to 70+ on a 40mph road, both were single carriageways and I often see them ignoring road signs that say "no entry", "no left/right turn" etc, such as one that's near me, says "no entry except cyclists" at one end, meaning motorvehicles can only LEGALLY travel on that road in one direction, so it's either, try to educate those who break the law, OR impose MUCH tougher penalties like a 6 month ban for mobile phone use.
DeleteYes by all means prosecute offenders but it never was or will be in the public interest to not prosecute in return for taking money for unauthorised courses instead. We used to jail coppers for taking money instead of proceeding by judicial process.
ReplyDeleteSo you think anyone except Parliament can authorise such an option? What are we a police state?
Why can't we hve a combination of better education for UK motorists AND much tougher penalties? That way, not only would motorists be held to a higher standard than they are now but they(and cyclists and horse riders) would also have better incentives than what seems to be pocket change to many and a slap on the wrist to stay within the law, would you or would you not agree that it would be better than it is now?
DeleteThe average driver will never be good or error free. You cannot make silk purse from sow's ears. Even the IAM can only improve drivers and no more. But for all that there's more death from accidents in the home than from any cause on the road and 5 times less than from NHS failure. So clearly UK drivers are doing well already.
ReplyDeleteMore jail? For a start society allows this highly dangerous scenario of opposing traffic and humans mingling with it too unlike ,rail, air and shipping,
because it actually keeps us all alive and then jails people when it goes wrong?
My point is that cyclists knowingly place themselves in great danger and seek revenge when it goes belly up.
So before we scream for more driver jail, let's identify what must be on these roads to keep society alive. If cyclists keep attacking drivers they then beg the question how important are they? And the fact is cyclists and horses on the road are two hazards society can manage without.
It's the demands of a certain minority of cyclists that are prompting these fair questions and answers. Hole & digging comes very much to mind in this.
G