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Careless

30th August 2012, Page 20
30th August 2012
Page 20
Page 21
Page 20, 30th August 2012 — Careless
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Which of the following most accurately describes the problem?

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The government is considering issuing fixed penalty notices for certain types of careless driving. CM looks at the implications this could have on commercial drivers

Words: Tim Ridyard The Department for Transport (DfT) launched a consultation in June that, as well as proposing increased fines for fixed penalty notice offences generally, suggests introducing fixed penalties for careless driving.

At the moment, careless driving – which includes driving without due care and attention, or driving without reasonable consideration for others – cannot be dealt with by a fixed penalty offer. It is either dealt with by prosecution, the offence attracting mandatory penalty points on the scale of three to nine, or a discretionary disqualification, plus a fine of up to £5,000. The proposal to make careless driving a fixed penalty offence is envisaged to cover situations where careless offending is witnessed by a police officer and, where there are no victims or collisions or complaints, from a member of the public. The DfT’s intention is not that fixed penalties, or remedial driver training, be used for more serious careless driving incidents, which it expects to continue to be prosecuted in court.

Targeting poor driver behaviour

Whether regulations to be published in due course will formally restrict fixed penalties to incidents witnessed by police officers or provide a general power in all careless driving cases remains to be seen. In any event, the purpose of the introduction of fixed penalty notices or remedial training in the context of careless driving is to target low-level, but nevertheless poor, driver behaviour. Examples cited in the consultation are: ● driving too close to a vehicle in front; ● being in the wrong lane on a roundabout; ● ignoring a “lane closed” sign and pushing into an orderly queue; ● lane discipline, such as remaining in lane two or three when lane one is empty and there is no other vehicle to overtake; ● inappropriate speed; and ● wheel spins.

The use of fixed penalty notices for careless driving is attractive to the DfT and police because it reduces bureaucracy. It is suggested that at the moment many drivers escape with a warning or no action because it is a cumbersome process for a driver to be prosecuted, whereas a fixed penalty notice is administered by giving the driver the option to pay the penalty in due course or contest the matter in court. This would not apply to the many cases involving allegations of careless driving not seen by police officers.

Solicitors deal with many cases where a commercial driver has a minor lapse, which often causes little damage to another vehicle or property and can easily be dealt with by an insurance claim. Often the driver is unaware of the incident from an enclosed cab, a long distance from the point of impact. The incident may be witnessed by a civilian who reports the matter to the police and, in due course, the driver is eventually prosecuted for not only careless driving but also for failing to stop and/or failing to report an accident; such offences attract penalty points in the 5 to 10 points range.

Sometimes negotiations with the prosecution take place whereby a guilty plea to careless driving is entered and failing to stop/report an offence is withdrawn.

These are invariably cases where, if the driver was aware and had stopped and exchanged details, the matter would be dealt with by the insurer and the case would never darken the courtroom door.

This new initiative raises all the usual arguments about the advantages and disadvantages of a fixed penalty system; the advantages are simplicity, ease of fine collection, drivers avoiding court costs and identical penalty for all drivers who are dealt with uniformly. ▲ Robert Wilcox, The debate centres on whether an expanding fixed MD at Somerset-based penalty system erodes the function of the magistrates’ Massey Wilcox court and acts as a disincentive to contesting matters where there is an actual or arguable defence.

While the introduction of fixed penalties for careless driving will, in practice, be restricted to police officer eyewitnesses – and hence cause drivers to find it hard to contest the case in court – it remains the case that, when a driver is faced with the stark choice of paying a relatively low fixed penalty or a much higher fine plus court costs if the case is contested and lost, there is no contest unless the driver has deep pockets.

How much will it cost?

The proposal in the consultation, which runs until 5 September, is that the fixed penalty for careless driving should be £90 and three penalty points. This is £30 higher than the fixed penalty for, say, speeding, which is fixed at £60. However, a separate part of the consultation sets out a proposal to increase road traffic fixed penalties to £90 generally and increase the existing fixed penalty for having no insurance by 50% to £300. n

● Tim Ridyard is a partner and road transport lawyer at Woodfines LLP in Cambridge. tridyard@woodfines.co.uk

Operator view

Robert Wilcox, MD at Somerset-based Massey Wilcox, says if the proposals improve driving standards, it will be a good thing. He would like to see police officers cracking down on instances where a truck is overtaking another one but the slower truck on the inside lane does not ease off and slow down.

“Another big problem for truck drivers is that car drivers often won’t let you out of a lane to overtake another vehicle, and lane discipline seems to be a lot worse than it used to be.

“There are a lot of bad manners on the road now, everyone seems to be in more of a hurry these days, the roads are busier, and people don’t stick to the correct lane. If fixed penalties tackle poor behaviour from drivers, they might make things better.” Wilcox believes the definition of what is careless driving under these proposals seems open to interpretation. “I’m not against it, as long as it is interpreted fairly; the problem might be an over-zealous police officer.”


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