Attention All Motorists! Pay Attention or Pay Up

We’ve all been there happily traveling along and then some idiot decides they need to in your lane or taking the exit and just cut you up. Well up until now you may have just said a few curse words and had a bit of a rant to your fellow passenger about how some people are a menace and shouldn’t be on the road. In some cases this is probably true however if we’re honest the majority of us have probably lost our concentration and accidentally got ourselves into the wrong lane or cut someone up at a roundabout at some point.

Well that little lapse of concentration might land you with a £100 fine under a new government road safety strategy that has been met with a mixed response. Some feel that this new tough approach on careless and irresponsible drivers is a good way of making our roads a little safer and less stressful to drive on by hitting those who make stupid and reckless decisions in their pockets if they’re caught.

The other side of the argument however is that this new strategy is full of flaws that just make it seem impractical. One objection is that there still has to be traffic police in the right place at the right time to catch people in the act of careless driving in order to fine them, which more often than not there isn’t. Another issue raised is that the persistent bad drivers who regularly commit these types of offences still will, just like speeding legislation doesn’t stop a lot of people exceeding national limits or those who still continue to use their mobile phone whilst driving despite it being illegal. The highly cycnical have even gone to the extreme of saying that this is just another money spinner thought up by a cash strapped government looking for another way to squeeze money out of the already hard hit motorist.

Some industry professionals have criticised the application of this new strategy on two grounds the first being that to enforce it additional funds will have to be found for more traffic police to be out on the roads so as not to further stretch police forces already under pressure from the spending cuts. The second criticism is that by law careless driving is a subjective test where it has to be proven that the level of care dropped below that of the competent driver, some legal professionals say this leaves a lot of grey areas that could see many motorists refusing to accept the fines and still opt to be taken to court instead.

Now we are all for Britain’s roads being a safer place motorists but it remains to be seen if Transport Secretary Philip Hammonds new strategy will have any significant effect. If you have any thoughts on this issue please let us know and leave your comments below.