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Speed camera disguised as builder's van is 'sneaky', say motorists

28/04/08

Motorists have accused road safety bosses of using underhand tactics and disguising a speed camera van to catch out unsuspecting drivers, reports the Burton Mail.

The accusations came after a photo of a police speed camera van disguised as blue builder's van was posted on a drivers' resource website, pistonheads.com.

Visitors to the website have called the action "illegal" and "sneaky" and have also highlighted that the camera team's website claims that it "actively announces" the locations of its cameras in a bid to slow motorists down.

However, a spokesperson for the Derbyshire safety camera team defended the van saying that when an initiative called Operation Focus was launched, the force had announced that it would be using both marked and unmarked vehicles in a bid to cut casualties.

A member of the Pistonheads website, Alex Lawrence, told the Mail: "The fact that these people are now resorting to camouflaging their cash machines refutes any claim that the cameras deter motorists from speeding. It simply makes them our 21st century highwaymen."

He claimed that studies have shown that speed cameras are ineffective and cause safe drivers to "bear points and fines from dangerously positioned camera vans" and that the vans' aim "is to make money, not increase safety".

There were 6,000 speed cameras on UK roads in 2004 resulting in over two million convictions, compared to only 4,500 cameras and one million convictions in 1999, according to speedcamera.org.

Around £120 million in revenue was generated in speeding fines during 2003 and a fifth of all UK drivers has been caught speeding since 1996 by a camera.

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