The results speak for themselves: speed cameras bring £10,000 to the Treasury every hour. In the past ten years, it was not only a huge increase in the number of tickets, but the current Government also raised fines from £40 to £60. The number of speed cameras on the roads reached 6,000.
Tory police spokesman David Ruffley, who compiled the figures, told dailymail.co.uk: “Labour are milking the motorist, who have been treated as a cash cow for the last ten years. Motorists have been milked by a Labour government desperate to fund a decade of spend, spend, spend.No wonder cameras on our roads are so unpopular with the British motorist.”
Statistics show there are 6 times more speeding cameras in UK than in France. The most profitable camera is on the M11 in Essex, which catches 500 speeding drivers a day. To look at the bright side, there are 1,745 fewer deaths and injuries a year at camera sites.
“The fact that more speeding fines are handed out every year suggests that speed cameras are more about raising revenue than reducing speeds on the roads.If any other policy had so clearly failed in its objective it would be scrapped but it seems that the authorities are too keen on the money speeding fines screw out of motorists,” said Matthew Elliott, chief executive of the TaxPayers' Alliance.
“This is not just hugely expensive, it is dragging the reputation of the law through the dirt. Fining anyone should be about justice, not fund-raising,” Elliott added.
UK Government rejects the idea of speeding cameras used just for fund raising for the Treasury and insists their purpose is to increase traffic safety, in order to save lives.
Speed cameras and raising the fines are just a part of the road safety plans that the current Government came up with this year. It recently made public it plans of reduction the speed limit on country roads from 60mph to 50mph and 20mph speed limit for the residential areas.
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