If you elect to defend against a speeding ticket...
Discussion
TooMany2cvs said:
Your solicitor can ask whatever they like, once the case comes up in court. But if you're thinking of going for a minor technicality breach-of-procedure, you can bet they've heard them all before and are prepared.
Some SCPs will make evidence available (such as calibration certs and the pictures of your offence) prior to you making a decision to accept a FPN. It might be that a speed awareness course is offered instead of FPN or summons.As for betting they've heard everything before and therefore it's not worth checking the details; that's a fairly self defeating argument. If nobody ever checked the procedures there'd be no need to follow them and it's likely things would get sloppy quickly. There will be mistakes made in any process, some minor and inconsequential like a typo in your VRN and others that are fatal to a prosecution, such as a NIP sent out of time. If drivers are expected to adhere strictly to regulatory safeguards such as speed limits, it's equitable that the state should also be expected to stick to it's own requirements.
As for the OP, if you know you were speeding and absent any serious fault with the SCP procedurally, suck it up!
allergictocheese said:
As for betting they've heard everything before and therefore it's not worth checking the details; that's a fairly self defeating argument.
Not quite what I said. My implication was that you'd better be pretty damn sure that there has been a testicle dropped, rather than just fishing off the back of some half-read pepipiffle.TooMany2cvs said:
Your solicitor can ask whatever they like, once the case comes up in court. But if you're thinking of going for a minor technicality breach-of-procedure, you can bet they've heard them all before and are prepared.
But it can undermine the quality of their case...I say that because in my day in court, I raised that after asking for map positions and calibration certificates, I was sent them from a fixed site camera 2 miles away when it was obvious from the image that it was a van in a different location.
I made the SCP aware of this before the court case so they just said "sorry!", but it did nothing to add to the quality of their case, and was indeed mentioned in the summing up of the case. (in my favour).
So no matter how insignificant, I'd still look into it.
TooMany2cvs said:
Your solicitor can ask whatever they like, once the case comes up in court. But if you're thinking of going for a minor technicality breach-of-procedure, you can bet they've heard them all before and are prepared.
Of course. It will never do to use some minor technicality to fight a minor technical offence. Phatboy317 said:
TooMany2cvs said:
Your solicitor can ask whatever they like, once the case comes up in court. But if you're thinking of going for a minor technicality breach-of-procedure, you can bet they've heard them all before and are prepared.
Of course. It will never do to use some minor technicality to fight a minor technical offence. TooMany2cvs said:
Phatboy317 said:
TooMany2cvs said:
Your solicitor can ask whatever they like, once the case comes up in court. But if you're thinking of going for a minor technicality breach-of-procedure, you can bet they've heard them all before and are prepared.
Of course. It will never do to use some minor technicality to fight a minor technical offence. From the other side though, it could be argued that it's similarly unlikely to achieve anything but a hit on drivers' wallets - so why do they bother?
Edited by Phatboy317 on Tuesday 13th January 12:28
Phatboy317 said:
From a driver's point of view, yes.
From the other side though, it could be argued that it's equally unlikely to achieve anything but a hit on drivers' wallets - so why do they bother?
No, you're not seeing the bigger picture. This is tied up with the statistics of very big numbersFrom the other side though, it could be argued that it's equally unlikely to achieve anything but a hit on drivers' wallets - so why do they bother?
An individual driver your risk of crashing is small. If we work on the assmumption that driving in excess of the limit increass your risk of crashing (or even just the severity if you do crash) then speeding increases a small risk to a slightly bigger, but still small risk. Hence why many people speed and never see any negative consequences. It's like the difference between buying 1 lottery ticket and 2. You have twice as much chance of winning but still f
k all chance, in reality. The same goes for buying 10 tickets. Although in general the odds of dying in a car crash are greater than the odds of winning the lottery, but it's a good illustration of the point.However from the authorities point of view it achieves a lot more. If they did not enforce the limit and follow through then a lot more people would speed and at the very least a greater number of the crashes that occured would be of greater severity. So the KSI stats would get worse. This matters because an accident and the ensuing KSI costs mosny in temrs of both the emergency response, the closing of a road, the resulting follow up through the NHS etc. The analogy with the lottery is that it is very unlikely that an individual will win but very likely, in fact probable that someone will win. If everyone doubles their chances of winning by buying two tickets then everyone is still very unlikely to win, but the number of winners will be double. So by driving faster you don't put yourself to much greater risk, but you authorities who have to deal with the fallout of those who are unlucky will see the difference.
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