The Association of British Insurers unveiled some radical plans this week and it’s a fair bet that most people under the age of 25 are not going to like them.
Its aim is to cut the “high levels of deaths and serious injuries involving young drivers” and you only have to have peek at the statistics to understand the problem. Read Full Article »
Research recently commissioned by the Ministry of Justice has highlighted some differences in the sentencing patterns between Magistrates and District Judges. They found that a custodial sentence was more likely to be given in a case heard by a District Judge(7%) than by magistrates (4%), although still in a minority of cases.
A couple of cases reported in the press yesterday seem to illustrate that reluctance.
Melvyn Reid was convicted in Scotland of driving with excess alcohol in his breath after he blew a mind blowing 179mg/100ml, the limit being 35. The court decided that because this was a first drink/drive conviction, imprisonment was not appropriate. Read Full Article »
As police forces begin rolling out their Christmas drink and drug driving campaigns a Norwich-based company is putting the finishing touches to what it claims is the world’s first portable fingerprint drug testing kit. Read Full Article »
The Transport Secretary’s insistence that the police be left to investigate the horrific crash on the M5 last week before anyone jumps to conclusions about its cause inevitably did little to stifle the debate about raising motorway speed limits.
In fact, if anything it pushed it back to the top of the agenda, with campaigners on both sides wading back in with their well trodden arguments about why 80mph is either a Good Thing or a Bad Thing. Read Full Article »
North Yorkshire Police’s attempt to crack down on speeding motorists has had a boost; funnily enough after it invested in its first ever speed camera van.
It sounds obvious, but sticking a liveried van by the side of the road with a camera poking out the back has cut the number violating the county’s speed limits.
In fact, nearly 5,000 motorists have been caught in the first three months of its operation. Read Full Article »