Sad Welsh police

[Jacket]

<The police are to blame in as much as they condone this type of revenue collection from innocent motorists by enforcing the law without argument , or protest.>

As I undersatnd it, both high ranking police officers and the police union have complained on numerous occasions, but to no avail. And whatever they think of it, when their boss (HM government) tells them to do it, they don't have much choice.

Also, remember, the police don't choose speed limits. Also, in all but a few counties, they don't choose the positions of the fixed speed cameras.

<The Police must shoulder their share of the responsibility for exploiting the relatively innocent for there own political & financial gain.>

The money goes to the government, not the police, so its hardly for their own financial gain. Also, most police would also prefer to be chasing real criminals. If nothing else, its more interesting (and involves less paperwork!) than spending all day standing behind a speed camera.

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[Jacket]

OK, should have phrased it better. I think it was either "could have been avoided" or "would have avoided serious casualties" if the vehicles had been travelling at the speed limit. But we could argue all day about whether the actual cause was the kid stepping out in front of the car, or the driver doing 40 and so not being able to stop in time.

I'd imagine its mainly due accidents in 30 limits- I'd have thought a lot of accidents happen around town, and the difference in reaction times and stopping distances at 30 and 40 mph is pretty large. Also, from the crash tests shown on TV, the chances of surviving a crash at 30 seem a lot better than at 40.

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[duncan]

Re: I hate to spoil a good story but...

and I am with Dave (as an ex rally driver as well).

one minute everyone is complaining about zero presence, the next zero tollerance.

I am not saint, not even close, but I have been know to piss of a lot of people following in 30 and 40 limits; most are comfortable at the 50 and 60 limits and I will admit to a healthy (bad but deliberate choice of words) disregard for the 70 limit. I would welcome vastly increased cameras / spot checks etc, esp around hot spots / schools etc but all we get are traffic clamiing measures that deflect the attention dangerously even at 30 - different subject.

Back on thread - the police would have been reacting to public opinion / requests etc in their activities around the rally - the failure is between the police and organisers to arrange appropriate transits but locals would not have accepted closure so a catch 22 exists, and organisers are loath to apply concessions on road sections because they get abused.

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[StugeronSteve]

"The money goes to the government, not the police"

I'm sure I read that the fines collected from "safety cameras" are retained by our local authority for the installation and operation of further cameras.

re: Welsh speed enforcement. One Thursday afternoon last year, M4 west of Cardiff. Beautiful afternoon, dry roads, great vis and very little traffic, when IMHO 80-85mph perfectly safe for experienced motorist with sound vehicle. Therefore, plod van on bridge with cameras. Return trip, Sunday afternoon, p***ing down with rain, heavy spray from vehicles, poor vis, w**kers flying down o/s lane 80+ mph. no plod, on a day when I would have nicked anyone topping 70!

Cameras have a place on our roads, but let's site them where they can protect the community, rather than act as act as 21st Century highwaymen.

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[bigmart]

Very laudible of you to support our boys in blue. You might have a different attitude when you ask one to uphold your rights as a citizen & get told that he can't be bothered, he's just hanging on until he gets his pension, he can't be bothered to chase criminals unless you catch them bang to rights but don't actually use any force or you will end up in prison because your easier to catch than the real thief. Ask Tony Martin.

With the exception of the Tony Martin part that is a brief summary of my experiences over the last 25 years.

Waste of space is being much too kind to these idiots.

Martin

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[nicho]

Best vote for the other lot at the next general election then. Duncan Smith has pledged to ditch speed cameras and up the Motorway limit to 80mph. He's got my vote for that alone!

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[oldgit]

Re: Welsh police doing what the majority want ?

If you speed and get caught tough!.........Easy peasy to prevent having to fork out for speeding tickets.
Obey the speed limits or get rid of the car..No more roadrage and lots of healthy walking.
See I have just saved you a fortune in cash(at the Gym) and have helped you keep trim. /forums/images/icons/laugh.gif

<hr width=100% size=1>Two boats please one here n one in the Med

 

[Gezzer]

<The money goes to the government, not the police, so its hardly for their own financial gain. Also, most police would also prefer to be chasing real criminals. If nothing else, its more interesting (and involves less paperwork!) than spending all day standing behind a speed camera.>

I think you will find the law changed on this about 18 months ago, it was in the past the case that the police only retained a nominal amount to cover costs, now about 10 counties within the U.K can retain the majority of fines collected.
The first was Northampton, the most camera populated county in the country now, they even employ civilians to man the mobile vans!!
Hampshire was added a few months ago, the result is 9 new cameras, there was zero before that, 2 of these are on a straight dual carriageway that went from 50 to 30 limit overnight.

However jacket you are right, most police forces do not condone the use of speed cameras, I know a few traffic police types, but in the end given the new laws re revenue collection they cannot resist.

As for the rally drivers, serves them right, I have myself competed in various types of motorsport, and done a little rallying, even (perhaps Nicho remembers) Real road Rallies in the dark of night in Wales, thank god they were outlawed, yes the timings were worked out at the relevant speed limit, but it was a different matter keeping to it without incurring a time penalty.

But in this day and age, road conditions and volume of traffic it is a different matter, and Colin and his mates are just easy pickings.

I,m no angel but having learnt the hard way, I try to keep to posted limits especially in built up areas and around schools, except on the motorway



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[arca]

Nicking motorists is a hell of a lot easier than catching burglars, muggers, rapists, etc. The local police cleared up 27% of burglaries last year. A great successess as it was up 1.5% on the previous year!. The police authority has one of the highest, if not the highest, rates of prosecution of motorists in the country. Now there is talk of adding £35 to motoring fines "to support the victims of crime"! The moral is be a burglar but dont drive - its safer and less costly.

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[BrendanS]

Not sure who this is attributable to , but very funny and cuttting:

Northants police celebrate eradication of all serious crime
A huge challenge, but they've pulled it off
by Flash Gorman


There was a twirling of ceremonial truncheons this weekend as
Northants Police announced they have reduced the level of serious
crime in their area to virtually zero, recognising just one such
crime this quarter.

Northants chief commissioner, Charles Fox, proudly announced the
results to a packed press conference. Wearing his red-and-gold "Head
Boy" badge presented to him the day before by home secretary David
Blindgit, Fox explained his remarkable working methods: "After a
careful study of the crime figures, we decided to make speeding the
main focus of our crime reduction efforts. To this end, we now have
only three crimes that we categorise as 'serious'. These are
speeding, driving too fast and not sticking to the speed limit.

"By concentrating on these appalling crimes," he continued, "and
recording only those that we haven't solved with the use of speed
cameras and hefty fines, we have reduced them to an impressive figure
of one and that's because I was in an emergency situation and had to
break the limit. Northants is now a better and safer place to live —
one where people drive a bit slower."

When questioned about other crimes, such as burglary, muggings and
sexual assaults — all of which have risen dramatically in the
Northants area, chief Fox was sanguine: "Obviously there are other
areas where we could improve but it's a question of priorities. I
don't think anyone would argue that doing 75 miles-per-hour on a
deserted motorway is a more serious offence than, say, mugging an old
lady."

He continued: "A speeding car is like a loaded gun and driving too
quickly is akin to going into a children's nursery and randomly
spraying automatic gunfire. And you show me a granny who would give
you £100 every time you caught a mugger."



Catching muggers and buglars are also a "ineffective use of
resources" explained Fox. "Catching criminals outside of cars is
extremely difficult and time consuming. We did get one image of
someone leaving the scene of a crime clutching a colour television
but he wasn't wearing a numberplate so we have been unable to
identify him. Short of filling the streets with well-trained,
motivated officers constantly on the look out for wrongdoing, I fail
to see what we can do about it these problems.

"Instead it makes far more sense to concentrate our resources on a
problem that we can have an immediate impact on. Burglary and other
such crime is often due to poverty and mentality — these are not easy
things to change. But once someone has had to pay several speeding
fines, you find their attitude changes. This is sustainable,
profitable policing at its best."


<hr width=100% size=1>Err, let me know if Depsol enters the forum, I'll go and hide

 

[Jacket]

<You might have a different attitude when you ask one to uphold your rights as a citizen & get told that he can't be bothered, he's just hanging on until he gets his pension, he can't be bothered to chase criminals unless you catch them bang to rights but don't actually use any force or you will end up in prison because your easier to catch than the real thief.>

I'll bet you've never been told that by the police. Mainly because they'll have been busy dealing with more serious crimes. Sure, the crimes we experience may seem serious to us, but they're mainly burglary or kids messing around. Yes, they should be delt with. But face facts. Until the government starts funding the police properly, so that they have sufficient people on duty, there's not a lot the police can do. Facing facts, a break in is upsetting, but not life threatening. When faced with limited manpower and the choice between attending RTAs, muggings, fights (knives, not fists) and the like, or a break in, which would you assign your men to first?

It sounds as though things are changing, and police forces are starting to get the money from the speed cameras. Definately not the best way of assigning the police extra money, but its about time they got some more funding. Two years ago, a friend was told that her division were going to be issued with knife proof jackets of her colleges were injured in attacks. They're still waiting, and in the meantime two more of them have been injured. To make matters worse, the injuries have generally been due to manpower shortages meaning that a single policeman's had to attend late night pub fights. How'd you like to have to face 20 drunks, many armed with knives and the like, on your own?

<Waste of space is being much too kind to these idiots.>

My only response to people who make comments like that is that I'd like to see you do their job for a fortnight. I know I could never do it, and have nothing but respect for those who do. They'll generally turn up at RTA's well before the ambulances, and have to deal with serious casualties on their own, with minimal medical training.

Could you talk a suicidal teenager out of jumping? I couldn't.
Are you brave enough to face half a dozen armed and drunk skinheads who've decided they don't like you?
Have you been shot at?
How would you feel about facing rioters throwing bricks and steel pipes at you, and unable to fight back?
Ending up in hospital several times a year as a result of injuries sustained while doing your job?

They do all this, and all most poeple can do is abuse them, just because they're upset at having been fined for breaking the law.

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[TwoStroke]

I can quite understand your sentiments.

Have been involved in an RTA and recently by finacee was mugged. The Police were prompt and gave us the time we needed - even a chopper to try catch the mugger!

However, the only time the majority of people see them is on speed camera duty - dutifully handing out tickets - on open roads in bright sunshine. The amount of times I've been caught doing a little over the limit and always on a summer day begars belief!

I do have respect for them in other aspects of their jobs - but when it comes to speed cameras - the respect disappears quickly. Considering the amount of deaths a year - car related deaths are a small proportion over all - and speed related deaths are even smaller.

As always, the motorist is a soft touch in the scheme of things. The government had better change their tack on this one otherwise they will loose what little repsect is left!

<hr width=100% size=1>How much to fill'er up!

 

[ecudc]

Sorry but speed limits are there for a reason and that is that speed kills. To give you some statistics:

A 1 mile and hour reduction in speed reduces the probability of accident by 5% and the risk of a fatality by 7%.

A 10% drop in speeds resulted in a 40% drop in fatalities and serious injuries after speed cameras were introduced in West London.

A pedestrian knocked down by a vehicle travelling at 40 mph has only a 5% chance of surviving; at 30 mph it is 45%.

I have seen a five-year-old child hit after it ran between two cars to fetch a ball. The driver did not stand a chance of stopping and it was travelling below the 30mph speed limit. The second highest cause of death in young men is car crashes and the majority of those were caused by excess speed.

The police are there to try and stop all lawbreakers. Just because we are not poor, drug taking hairy muggers does not make our lawbreaking any better. We run the risk of killing someone every time we speed or drive when we've had one to many or just take that one phone call on our mobile and killing someone IMHO is a much greater crime than mugging.


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[TwoStroke]

If you want stats then:

There are 24 million cars on the UK roads.

There are 628,000 deaths a year in the UK.

There are 3500 car deaths a year in the UK. Therefore there are 5 out of 1000 deaths are contributed to cars - and to car drivers is 1 in every 1000.

Cancer is a bigger killer than cars!

<hr width=100% size=1>How much to fill'er up!

 

[bigmart]

Sorry to disappoint you but I am afraid that I have been told twice by serving police officers, during the course of their job, that they were just hanging around for their pension & once that they may be able to do something if I cought the criminals(we are talking, on all occaisions burglary here). On another occaision I was offered a load of stolen property by an officer who couldn't be bothered to re-patriate it with it's proper owner &, as he was letting me have some of mine back, would I like it.

I could quote you many other situations where the Police response was less than desireable.

I have a poor respect for the police because the police lost it, through their own actions, not because I started that way. It is a poor reflection on our society that we put up with such poor service from our public servants & more fools us for letting them get away with victimising the motorist whilst they let serious criminals escape with monotonous regularity.

Martin



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[Jacket]

<It is a poor reflection on our society that we put up with such poor service from our public servants>

So did you complain about the policeman who offered you stolen goods? He'd have been out of a job and without a pension if you had.

As a thought, what do you expect the police to do when you're burgled, given the current level of police funding?

When I've had to report breakins, the attitude I've found is more a resignation that they can't do anything, rather than deliberate unhelpfulness. Maybe I've just been lucky.

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[Castletine]

Bring out the Gimps

The real issue is the fact that the Police are critically underfunded and are 'pimped' by the Government to generate extra revenue.

So let's look at it from the Government's perspective. Statistics can always be twiddled to make them look good, so that it takes the rise of serious crime into account because it is now measured 'in another way' and becomes a drop rather than a rise.

The real fact is that by catching petty criminals like burglars, rapists, armed robbers, drug dealers etc (remember that the parameters of what is a serious criminal has changed) the Government has to spend money rather than make money to bring them to justice, and then observe and compensate these people for breaching human rights. So these people are left free to continue, and in the case of Tony Martin's antagonist rewarded for their crimes and remain a threat against the safety of all within our communities.

The prime target is the mass of mainly law abiding middle classes where the cost of a speeding fine, parking fine, parking ticket, tax on fuel, road tax, 5% on insurance premiums will hurt, but not hurt enough to cause a riot. What a great way of making money as there is enough of us to make a considerable sum. A soft target and a target that will continue to be squeezed with new and inventive ways of 'punishing' us financially for petty misdemeanors.

And why the ever decreasing funds to pay for the Police? - well there's no serious crime any more according to the new statistics, so there's no need to release extra funds into the Police force. And who cares if the public hate the Police force, rather that than hate the Politicians.

So, we're aware of what is happening, Police morale is at an all time low and real crime is on the increase, so to whitewash all this and try and create the image that the Govenment (not the Police note) is dead against serious crime, an all out PR campaign is generated to show the Police bringing the lowest criminal of all; Paedophiles to justice, stick them on the stage and then tell us, the general public, just how we're being amply protected from ALL criminals.

Politicians are thieves. They have the law behind them and that makes it 'legal'. When the Politicians want to enforce for profit they bring out the Police 'Gimps'.

And the money generated by the cameras is going, as the Government would have us believe, to victims of crime - like Tony Martin's antagonist?

So the moral is become a Politician, rob a bank, hijack a member of the public to drive your getaway car thus escaping the fine, if you're unlucky be sentenced to 10 years and serve 1, gain compensation through breach of your human rights, be released back into society and be provided with a home, an income to tide you over until your next 'job' and if you're a peer: return to the House of Lords. Not a bad way to live.

One last thing. In support of Tony going to war, I've just heard they've just unearthed one of Saddam's Weapons of Mass Destruction, and it did take 45 minutes to get ready - it is by all accounts a 1978 Austin Allegro 1300.


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[Castletine]

Bring out the Gimps

The real issue is the fact that the Police are critically underfunded and are 'pimped' by the Government to generate extra revenue.

So let's look at it from the Government's perspective. Statistics can always be twiddled to make them look good, so that it takes the rise of serious crime into account because it is now measured 'in another way' and becomes a drop rather than a rise.

The real fact is that by catching petty criminals like burglars, rapists, armed robbers, drug dealers etc (remember that the parameters of what is a serious criminal has changed) the Government has to spend money rather than make money to bring them to justice, and then observe and compensate these people for breaching human rights. So these people are left free to continue, and in the case of Tony Martin's antagonist rewarded for their crimes and remain a threat against the safety of all within our communities.

The prime target is the mass of mainly law abiding middle classes where the cost of a speeding fine, parking fine, parking ticket, tax on fuel, road tax, 5% on insurance premiums will hurt, but not hurt enough to cause a riot. What a great way of making money as there is enough of us to make a considerable sum. A soft target and a target that will continue to be squeezed with new and inventive ways of 'punishing' us financially for petty misdemeanors.

And why the ever decreasing funds to pay for the Police? - well there's no serious crime any more according to the new statistics, so there's no need to release extra funds into the Police force. And who cares if the public hate the Police force, rather that than hate the Politicians.

So, we're aware of what is happening, Police morale is at an all time low and real crime is on the increase, so to whitewash all this and try and create the image that the Govenment (not the Police note) is dead against serious crime, an all out PR campaign is generated to show the Police bringing the lowest criminal of all; Paedophiles to justice, stick them on the stage and then tell us, the general public, just how we're being amply protected from ALL criminals.

Politicians are thieves. They have the law behind them and that makes it 'legal'. When the Politicians want to enforce for profit they bring out the Police 'Gimps'.

And the money generated by the cameras is going, as the Government would have us believe, to victims of crime - like Tony Martin's antagonist?

So the moral is become a Politician, rob a bank, hijack a member of the public to drive your getaway car thus escaping the fine, if you're unlucky be sentenced to 10 years and serve 1, gain compensation through breach of your human rights, be released back into society and be provided with a home, an income to tide you over until your next 'job' and if you're a peer: return to the House of Lords. Not a bad way to live.

One last thing. In support of Tony going to war, I've just heard they've just unearthed one of Saddam's Weapons of Mass Destruction, and it did take 45 minutes to get ready - it is by all accounts a 1978 Austin Allegro 1300.



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[bigmart]

Perhaps you got the wrong end of the stick when I said I was offered stolen goods by the police officer. He was returning some of my stolen property to me, that had been recovered from a lock up garage after a criminal had asked for the usual 200 other offences to be taken into consideration, he then offered me some of the other goods recovered because it was too much effort to trace the true owners & he had to leave it somewhere or fill in a load more paperwork. Not such a criminal act but still rather disappointing.

Contrary to what you may believe of me, I don't expect perfection, a professional attitude would help.

Martin

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[StugeronSteve]

Like all other public servants the police carry the can for the policies of the government. A cynic would suggest that whilst the public are engaged in hating the police force they're not moaning about their elected representatives. Lets face it, so far we have had the teachers, the doctors, the firemen, and goodness knows who else, portrayed as the forces of darkness.

Yes, the Home Office directs policy and the plod have to dance to the tune, but it does bug me to see speed cameras flashing on deserted stretches of motorway when young thugs are performing "donuts" in our local shopping precinct car park, before racing down the high street and back, over two or three zebra crossings and junctions, without a lawman to be seen. Only an idiot wouldn't acknowledge that the higher the speed, the more serious the accident, but surely this applies mainly to urban and residential areas.

Let's have a camera outside every school, on every pedestrian crossing and at known accident black spots (and maybe even consider warning about the danger rather than the camera), but let's leave the straight sections of dual carriageway alone, or set the cameras for 80+ (so that we might be able to spend more time looking at the road than the instrument panel).

A little bit of sense and explanation of police policy at local level would be great PR. Our law enforcers are under manned, under funded and under stretched, so let's hear more from ACPO and the Police Federation about the lunacy of government policy.

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