Drivers have been warned they face a fine of up to £1,000 if they use social media to warn people about the locations of mobile speed cameras. The warning comes after one driver was todk to take down a facebook post highlighting the location of a sped camera in North Wales - with a picture of the site.
Drivers will now frequently take to social media to let people know if they spot a mobile speed trap, with Facebook groups and pages dedicated to spreading the word. But police have now said drivers who alert others to a police speed trap could be in breach of section 89 of the Police Act 1997, designed to penalise anyone who “wilfully obstructs” a constable in the execution of his or her duty. Breaking this law can also lead to up to one month in prison, reports NorthWalesLive.
A spokesperson for the North Wales Poilce road policing unit said: “Publicising the locations of speed traps hampers the good work that staff and officers do to reduce speeding motorists, which is one of the “Fatal Five” offences. Motorists could be prosecuted if they are caught warning other drivers on the road for any speed trap.”
The warning comes as it was recently revealed that more than one in six speeding offences detected by police in England and Wales is cancelled. Analysis of Government data by the RAC Foundation revealed that 400,000 (17%) of 2.4 million speeding cases in the 12 months to the end of March last year were dismissed.
This is up from 13% during 2019/20.
There are several reasons why offences are cancelled, such as:
– Faulty speed cameras.
– Cloned vehicles carrying false number plates.
– Emergency vehicles lawfully breaking speed limits.
– Delays in issuing notices of intended prosecution.
– Lack of resources to bring cases to court.
The RAC Foundation said some of these issues could have been exacerbated by the coronavirus pandemic. The highest proportions of cancelled speeding cases during 2020/21 were in Greater Manchester and Warwickshire, both at 39%.
Wiltshire, which has no fixed speed cameras, saw the lowest proportion of dismissed cases, at just 2%.
RAC Foundation director, Steve Gooding, said: “It is correct that drivers caught speeding should face the consequences, but it is also important that the systems of detection and prosecution are robust. The hundreds of thousands of cancelled offences each year indicate they are not. At the very least it is an administrative burden the police could do without.
“We urge the Home Office to start collecting data from police forces about these cancelled offences so we can understand where the problem lies.”
Adam Snow, a lecturer at the law school of Liverpool John Moores University, who worked on the report, said: “Police forces and local authorities are seeing number plate cloning as a growing problem. With the increasing reliance on camera enforcement for clean air zones and moving traffic violations, there is some evidence to suggest more motorists are seeing this as an acceptable response even though it is fraud.”
The total number of speeding offences detected was down by only 6% on the previous year, despite traffic volumes falling by more than a quarter due to coronavirus lockdowns.
