I wrote an article recently on the preponderance of distracting road signs. This follows on nicely from that premise inasmuch as the British Governments obsession with safety and the nanny state continues to gather steam, despite widespread opposition from an angry population. The subject of this diatribe? The dreaded speed camera.
In 2006 it was reported that there were an estimated 4.2 million surveillance cameras in the UK, that is about 1 camera for every 14 people. If we had that ratio of teachers to students perhaps we wouldn’t need cameras in the first place, but I digress. The most watched nation in the world doesn’t just watch you in the street, but it likes to look at you when you are driving too, but the 6000 cameras that watch you drive are a little more sinister.
Placed at accident ‘black spots’, the cameras were first widely welcomed as a way to reduce road deaths by encouraging drivers to slow down – speed being one the major factors in fatal accidents. A photograph would be taken of any offender who broke the speed limit, and a fine would be sent to the owner of the vehicle, as sourced from the license plate. There were rumblings of contention even in the early days, as people complained that the cameras were hidden. These people had little sympathy at the time though as they were clearly law breakers.
The number of convictions sky rocketed as police forces the country wide started adding speed cameras to increasingly less dangerous locations. It soon became rather noticeable that they were being placed less, in areas of real danger, and more in areas where even a law abiding and cautious driver could easily be caught for a minor infraction of the speed laws. The accusation that they were being hid in order to catch people out was still being bandied about, and gathering increasing support. It was generally thought that the police forces were pocketing the money, but the law stipulated that money generated from speed cameras could only be spent on more cameras, and their upkeep.
This alerted the Government that thought this was a terrible waste of resources, and had a proportion of that income from speed cameras, paid to itself with the promise that it would be spent on further road safety matters, but there is, as yet ,no proof that this has ever happened.
Today, everyone knows where the cameras are, and slow down accordingly. Only to speed up again around the corner. There are atlases that can be bought that detail the location of each and every one of them. The bane of my existence – road signs – have been placed in copious quantities on road side the country wide. Some cameras are even painted in fluorescent colours, so there is really little excuse for being caught, unless you just happen to be in a hurry. Yet the reduction in road deaths that the cameras proponents claimed have not been borne out, and the number of convictions continues to rise – as do the Governments coffers.
