Cannot Believe This...

[Jonathan]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/6251936.stm

Anyone who has any info on this I would be grateful to hear.

I always thought it was for the Police, prosecutors to gain evidence to bring charges ?

They've in effect charged and convicted the blokes with NO evidence.

If this was put before a Jury no sane person would convict them - wait, isn't that what they're looking to do, no more trial by Jury ?

[Loose Cannon]

So, the right to silence, a cornerstone of justice harking back to the trial of Christ, is set aside if you "choose to own a car"

This Europewide political perversion against car ownership is as astounding as the rise of the Nazis in the 30s.

As someone pointed out on another forum, if you control how the populace move about, you control everything.

Edited June 29, 2007 by britten_mark

[Kimbers]

Interesting interview on Radio 5 Live this morning with transport ministers etc saying they want to make speeding more socially unacceptable than drink driving as "Most deaths are caused by speeding and it would save pollution". To do this they aim to set a mandatory speed limit ANYWHERE, except main roads, at 20mph.

This is typical bollocks and the fact they're saying I pollute more in a Hybrid doing 80 than a 4x4 doing 20mph is utter bollocks. Like you say, bit by bit the control of everyday lives is getting worse. i heard rumours that making drinking as socially unacceptable as smoking is the next big thing as the NHS and police reckon they spend more on the results of drinking than smoking. (now that smoking is virtually banned they need to raise revenues somehow!)

[lottylotus]

so do we all accept that doing 40 or 50 in a 30 mph zone is ok,i am sorry but i do not agree

[Jonathan]

Yeah I kinda thought someone might fall into that one.

The offence does not matter - it doesn't make a difference if this was a murder or someone nicking penny sweets from a shop -it's completely beside the point.

If this was turned into case and no one challenged it, you could have police (who are by the most, ignorant of the law itself - see: various blunders in legal history) basically saying to you "own up to it, if you don't we'll just pin the blame on you anyways".

Innocent until proven guilty.

[Simon350S]

I am generaly of the mindframe of driving at a speed suitable to the type of road, area it is situated and the weather conditions. I completely do condone driving at 40mph - 50mph in certain 30mph zones when the conditions and area are suitable to do so, but there are areas where dong 30 mph is just not safe and 15-20mph is much more sensible, and at these points I do drive slower than the speed limit and get people up my ass who dont know any better.....!!!!!

Theres astretch of road by us that is now a 20mph blanket speed limit due to there being 2 schools nearby....... complete rubbsh though..... why if i'm doing 35-40 mph at 3am in the dry on a warm summers night should I get points and a fine...... I'm doing nothing dangerous......!!!!!

Also on the motorway...... 70mph.......... what bollox....... again..... at 8:30am I can legally do 70mph in the rain, whizzing past the traffic, just waiting for someone slower to pull out last second and wipe me out......

But at 3am, anything over 70mph is dangerous??? no one for miles round, perfectly lit roads, nice dry night.... why shouldn't I be able to drive along at 100-120 why not go the whole hog and say whatever the car is safely capable of doing and I'm capable of opperating efficiently at.....

UTTER CRAP.....!!!!!

POLICE DRIVING STANDARDS AND DONT TAR EVERYONE WITH THE MUPPET BRUSH.......!!!!!!

One job I have always wanted is that of a Traffic Officer, from a very young age its been a dream of mine, to helpmake the roads a safer place to be.... unfortunately these days its no more than a Speed regulation officer.....

If I want to speed I guess all I have to do is knick a car, drive it flat out unisured through a built up area past all the speed cameras whilst school is kicking out all the little rugrats.... whack it down the motorway at VMAX..... cause in reality the chance of ever getting caught by a real police officer is pretty low..... and the SCAMERA team will never catch up with me.....!!!!!!!!

The whole lot stinks.....

Dont often loose my rag but this is shit.....!!!!!

Simon

p.s. theres probably loads of spelling and gramatical errors but I couldn't give a damn.....!!!

[Kimbers]

Simon,

The best way around it is to be under 16, steal a car and not bother if you're caught or not because you know they'll not be able to touch you anyway.

then laugh as you watch some poor, tax paying bloke getting a speeding ticket for doing 45 in a 40 limit (with no schools or anything dangerous near) in his perfectly legal, taxed and insured car.

[BadJelly350]

I actually read one of the government's white papers last year (or was it the year before), it actually cited evidence of the increased pollution output of modern car engines when driving at 20mph as one of the reasons for not introducing this speed limit in more places. The report asserted that if they did the government would stand no chance of meeting the CO2 emmission standards that they have signed up to.

Bottom line with this one, we're never going to get the 'sensible' limit imposed where you can do what you like so long as it is safe as we've gone too far down the road of reducing traffic police numbers and the government (with the help of scamera partnerships) have demonised speed as a be-all-and-end-all of accidents.

I've spent most of the last couple of years in the US in California. Traffic police absolutely bl**dy everywhere. The one time I did something slightly iffy (ie went a bit quick round a junction that wasn't 'right turn on red' and actually went round it as it turned to red with a slight tyre squeal) I look in my mirror 200 yards later to see the red and blues flashing in my mirror. If it weren't for my UK license confusing him I would've been done.

No sign of any cameras, just loads of police on the road. Much better.

Andy

Simon,

The best way around it is to be under 16, steal a car and not bother if you're caught or not because you know they'll not be able to touch you anyway.

then laugh as you watch some poor, tax paying bloke getting a speeding ticket for doing 45 in a 40 limit (with no schools or anything dangerous near) in his perfectly legal, taxed and insured car.

[t70]

I'm agreeing with everything here... drive to road conditions/population/harzards etc.. Why can I drive 100km/h on the highway when it's freezing rain??? Why can I drive 50km/h in the winter when the roads are completely covered in ice!? My stopping distance increases by at least a factor of 2... thus I should be able to drive 75 km/h in the summer if I can do 50 km/h in winter. I don't agree with doing 75 in the city on side streets-- they should be 50 or less. Then there's the single highway (opposite traffic heading at each other on one road) where the speed limit is 100km/h and it's only 10 km/h faster when the highway is divided???? so a combined speed of 200km/h is okay but 120 km/h isn't????? arghhh!

[Evil_Dr_Fish]

I completely agree with you Simon!

Otis - In France they have two speed limits "dry" and "wet".

Don't get me started on the hippies!

The trouble is, there ARE people out there who believe that the moment you go over 30 that people are diving for their lives, babies are crying and children are being mown down!

I have had several arguments with 20 year olds who took objection to my car and how it was designed to be driven. This "kill your speed" bollocks has actually affected a lot of young people who have grown up with it.

The only reason speeding kills more than drink driving is because MOST people know how f**ing insane it is to drink drive. It is an utterly perverse abuse of statistics to say "X-people killed by drink drivers" ... "X-people times 2 killed by speeding" therefore speeding is more dangerous... when clearly FAARRRRRRRRR less drink driving occurs than speeding!

One way more to accurately compare the two is by deaths per "drunk miles driven" and "per fast miles driven" - or you could use time instead of distance. Either would yield a massive re-balance in the reality (ie - drink driving is way more dangerous!)

I worked out that over the runs I have been on in less than a year (including Paris) that collectively we had driven in excess of a quarter of a million miles (ooOOoooo - just imagine all the daisies dying! )

Insurance companies have an 'average accident expectation' of 30,000 miles - ie the average bod has one accident every 30k miles (for most joe-shmoes that would be 3-6 years).

In 250,000+ miles our accident rate?

NIL.

'Nuff sed.

Speed Kills? My arse!

Edited June 30, 2007 by Evil_Dr_Fish

[andydclements]

I agree with Robin's comments.

If we relied on the bare fact that more people die as a result of accidents where speed was a factor than accidents where alcohol was a factor, then we'd ban alcohol and cigarettes, and allow peole to carry mahine guns in the UK.

I admit, I like to travel faster than 20 mph, but there are lots of places where I'd argue 20mph is too fast, and I don't mean a blancket ruling of within 1/2 mile of a school etc. Most days I travel along a small road near Norwich, it has a 20mhp limit, most days I meet one or more vehicles coming the other way, and that means one of us finding a gate way as 2 cars cannot pass.

There's no foot path, it has several blind corners, steep banks, soil regularly forms a thick layer on the road (leaves in Autumn). So how safe is it for the pedestrians and equestrians who use that road if cars travel at 20 mph through there? I'd say it aught to be dropped to a lower limit than that, but why bother? After all I regularly join the road and have no vehicle behind me, but find somebody then sits on my rear bumper upset they had to slow down form 40mph.

However, compare doing 40 in a 20 limit, and the increased danger of accidents, the increased level of damage etc with doing 90 in a 70 limit. I think the speed limits need to be reviewed, and maybe if politicians weren't so scared of upsetting a few voters (who, in private probably would welcome the change) they'd raise the limit on some roads, and start looking at the proportional increase in speed and road conditions, teperateure etc, not just the actual variance in mph.

Andy

[tb3033]

Hi,

I suppose at least we know where we stand on the speed (safety?) camera issue... completely shafted.

It wouldn't bother me so much if the devices in addition to the seemingly unstoppable wave of speed reductions actually produced safer roads. In my opinion they don't. I've yet to see convincing statistical evidence that less people are being injured on our roads, and I think I even overheard someone on R4 saying they have risen slightly.

Who decides on speed limit changes? I assume its the same corrupt bunch of part-time failed inept busy-bodies who decide when to collect our rubbish, how to mow the lawns in the cemetery and whether we can erect a shed... great!

Hmmm

Ambrose

[mayevora]

Got to get a few things in perspective. Speed limits on all roads are there for a reason whether we like it or not and its not going to change. Anybody whos first thought is that speed limits are there for government fundraising purely for fines, is an idiot. You NEED to have speed limits. I do agree that the current limits set in certain places make no sence at all, but you have to have peramiters set. What you consider to be a safe speed to drive at, could be completely inapproapriate to somebody else of lesser experience or who's abbilities aren't as honed as they possibly should be - so limits need to be set at a lower level. I'm not saying this is right although struggling to come up with a better solution. The fines are there as a deterant and people choose to adhear at their risk. (Pretty sure if the fine was

[Kimbers]

Ambrose, Just ask Robin who sets the speed limits and changes them. He'll happily tell you (and he is in the right job to be in the know, believe me) that the speed limits are set in a similar way as Co2 limits, by a very small, but vocal, minority of green tree huggers and serial "interferers" (remember Mary Whitehouse telling us she was old enough to have enjoyed herself but didn't want anyone else doing the same?).

Here's a cracking example. I have recently been advising the inland revenue with ways to help the govt reduce private car useage for business use. You see, they can't monitor Co2 and limit you by cost unless it's a company vehicle (which in this country you get charged for based on it's Co2 rate as a percentage of it's list price). So they want to force people back into company cars.

Now I'm an industry expert on this kind of thing. BUT. I found out recently who else they have been consulting with on this issue.

Is it Company car buyers for large companies? No.

How about Other industry experts? No.

Hmmm, Manufacturers? Nope.

Company Tax experts? Nope

See if you can guess.............

Well, out of about 20 "Experts" it appears that I am the only one in the industry, with any knowledge of the industry, or even knows how the current system works. I could list the people, but let me just give you the names of the "Groups" some of them represent.

Friends of the Earth

Greenpeace

A well known University Enviromental Sciences expert

Dept of the Enviroment

Dept of Transport...........Enviromental minister.

Inland revenue

Now do you get the idea of who's setting your limits and why things like road pricing are totally against everything anyone with any knowledge of the industry knows.

the only one there who is in the know is the Inland revenue and they have an alterior motive. One of the other problems is that I am just a fringe player, being contacted by e-mail whilst this lot are on the board.

Now are you ?

You should be, because it's the same group who are "looking into national road pricing" YES!! These are the governments experts. Experts at something totally unrelated. Send em to the North pole to examine the ice melting for about 20 years I say!!

[nicksoldies]

Speed does not kill. Bad driving and lack of road sense causes accidents - and that applies equally to drivers and pedestrians. If the training was good enough, we would not need so much legislation.

It's easier (and probably cheaper) to legislate for the weakest link or the scumbags and let the rest of us suffer than it is to be selective. Hence we get unrealistic blanket speed limits because a large percentage of drivers and pedestrians are below a reasonable standard, we get speed humps because of the scumbags, etc. etc. I constantly come across retards who use the crossing buttons and hold me up when the road is virtually empty. They cannot even cross a quiet road without state aid. Until the country has a change in attitude and teaches people they must take responsibility for their actions, things will not improve. If a pedestrian runs in to the road without looking and gets hit by a car breaking the speed limit, it is the drivers fault. What a lot of toss. I say, look where you are going, you are responsible for yourself.

Years ago, people were more resposible for their actions but in this poitically correct, liberal and weak society we have, it's always somebody elses fault. It is sickening to see how sad this country has become. No wonder 1000 a week are bailing out.

Virtually every recent piece of legislation affects the innocent majority in order to deter the few. Recent terrorist legislation affects us all because the system hasn't the balls to target the reall offenders in case they upset or offend a minority. Well I've got news for them, it bloody well upsets and offends me. If the rescouces were put in to actually dealing with offenders selectively and leaving the rest of us alone, our country would be a much nicer place to live. The only problem is it takes more effort and, I suspect, more funding. It also requires government who actually care about the way average people have to live.

[islandbloke]

One of the reasons I moved here 10 years ago was the Manx approach to road regulations.

Outside of built-up areas there's generally NO speed limit. But crash at even 20mph anywhere and the chances are you'll be charged with driving without due care etc. Very pragmatic approach, I'd say.

Of course, we have an increasing number of tree-huggers and thought police here too who are DETERMINED to invoke maximum speed limits everywhere...but in a smaller community like ours, we at least have a chance of fighting them off (even if it's only a delaying tactic).

[Paul C]

Laws, Laws, laws...

Every time i take the Esprit out i'm breaking enough of them.

Whats a few more that i pay no notice too?

Even travelling home in my van, i'm sure i break enough laws to

lose my license every day of the week, who's really bothered?

Everyone breaks some law or other every day, who's there to stop them?

When the van and car are safely parked and i'm out at night stealing

saplings from the Showhome garden, i could probably get done for that

too, right?

Keeps e'm peeled, don't get caught, do as everyone else does.

or...

Why argue forever about Laws on the ridiculous pretext that you plan to obey them?

when you know you won't, everyone else knows you won't, they won't. But still carry

on arguing the 'If i...' case until the end of time. Its a lesson on how to stay angry IMO.

[Jonathan]

BTW this actually had nothing to do with the rights / wrongs of speeding

It was the fact the guys got done becuase they had their right to silence (not incriminating one's self) removed.

I think Mark was the only one to pick up on it

[Paul C]

BTW this actually had nothing to do with the rights / wrongs of speeding

It was the fact the guys got done becuase they had their right to silence (not incriminating one's self) removed.

I think Mark was the only one to pick up on it

I know what the start subject was mate, i was posting on the theme the thread had adopted.

Anyhow, the guy admitted he was driving and then retracted his

admission when he thought he could squeeze out of it using his

right to silence.

IMO he had lost his right to silence by already by using his 'right to

be stupid' and admitting he was driving, then trying to back out of it.

I killed him / i didn't kill him etc,etc

Deserved to be done.

[Jonathan]

There were 2 guys

Admitedly if you go "fair cop guv" then retract it you deserve to get hit harder just for being super stupid.

Yet again though this isn't the point, the instance here is that the perp. of the crime hasn't been identified yet they are still going ahead and punishing them....without any proof.