Mine was:

The was a young man lived Edinburgh way
Who drove down to England one day
A speed camera he passed
Driving far far too fast
Now he’s sorry and he’s gonna have to pay

explained i needed my car for work, to see my daughter etc.

This really is one of my pet peeves. If they stopped going soft on people because they “need their car” then perhaps people who think twice in the first place. Not your case specifically V7fmp, but you hear stories of people who have played this card 10 times and gotten away with it.

We should adopt a modern version of the “sans permit” class of cars, as they have in france. get people out of their Chelsea tractors and into Citreon Ami’s

explained i needed my car for work, to see my daughter etc.

Wouldn’t make any difference in my judgement. You can use buses, trains, taxis, bicycles etc,.
Do people also get let off drink driving because they need to get to work in their car?

Had twp speeding tickets over 40 years, the last was for 80mph on the A1M on bone dry roads with very light traffic

Did my speed awareness course and had to correct the couple of muppets delivering it on a least two occasions as they were telling people things that were plainy incorrect- yes i am that ****
Even though i felt my speed was neither excessive or dangerous i now set the cruise control at 77mph….

@olly & @kerley – i will never know if it made the judge consider it during my case, i was just sharing what i said during my time in court. did it change my ban from more than 56 days to less, who knows? Thankfully i would like to think that a judge can tell the difference between someone trying to apologise for their own foolish actions and someone just talking garbage in an attempt to lighten the punishment.

As the old saying goes, if you cant do the time, dont do the crime. I did the crime, paid the fine and spent two months riding my bike, getting lifts etc etc.

But i went to court, admitted it was a moment of madness/stupidity, apologised, explained i needed my car for work, to see my daughter etc. I got a £275 fine and 56 day ban. A worthy punishment for my stupidity.

To quote the whole paragraph. You still got banned, you learnt your lesson.

Which is what it should be. If it doesn’t inconvenience you enough it’s not a punishment and you won’t learn. I don’t care if you need 3 hours and 4 buses to get to work, or Tarquin can’t have music lessons, or granny has to get a taxi to her hospital appointment. Its meant to be a **** punishment.

Ended up with 6 month ban & £800 fine.
I’m lucky that it won’t affect my job but it’s unfortunate that my girlfriend will have to do all the driving on our trip to Cornwall in the summer.
Back on the road for Christmas.

Can’t even commiserate with a pint as I’m on antibiotics.

ooooosh!

Well, we live and learn.

Enjoy the walk home?!? 😀

@MoreCashThanDash – why quote the whole thing, when you can cherry pick a part of a paragraph to really cement yourself on your moral high horse! That is the STW way! 😛

But yeah, like you say, it would be a farce if the punishment didnt fit the crime. Which i believe in my case it did and i embraced it.

Has it stopped you speeding now?

why quote the whole thing, when you can cherry pick a part of a paragraph to really cement yourself on your moral high horse! That is the STW way! 😛

Because I’m the leader of a new rebel alliance and have a strange thing about being fair to people. I can’t see it catching on though.

OP – ouch. I’m taking that as a reminder to be more careful when I next drive.

So how fast were you going mos! 😬

Not your case specifically V7fmp, but you hear stories of people who have played this card 10 times and gotten away with it.

You hear stories! But can you bring actual people who have pulled that line off 10 times in a court? I very much doubt it. You can try that argument the first time to stop a very high speeding being an immediate ban. If you then get another 6 points in 3 years you’ll become a “totter” at which point you can try the same argument again as part of an exceptional hardship plea (there’s a bit more to it than just standing there saying “I really need my car”), about 1:4 of the people making such a plea succeed (many more just accept their fate too). If you succeed – you still get the points but you cannot use the same basis for another exceptional hardship plea within 3 years. And the courts do keep records and do check up with each other on the basis of exceptional hardship used before. SO, if people are managing to make this argument more than twice its either over a protracted period, or they were never actually going to get banned anyway.

Magistrates hate cyclists even more than speeding drivers, get someone to give you a lift.

I’m going to call that out as nonsense. I think if you turn up in full lycra with your helmet on and clip-clop roady shoes though you might raise a few eyebrows (although I’ll bank on it they’ve seen worse!). I am sure that there are some magistrates who find cyclists irritating, but its certainly not so commonplace to make such a generalisation. It may shock you to know that some magistrates even ride bikes. Sometimes even to get to court.

it’s unfortunate that my girlfriend will have to do all the driving on our trip to Cornwall in the summer.

You’ll be popular there, then. I don’t think I’ve ever been forgiven for the Mrs doing all the driving in France as I’d left my driving license behind.

Rather old article now so thingsay gave tightened up

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-40862975

Rather old article now so thingsay gave tightened up

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-40862975

You’d hope, frankly. I thought there had been some sentencing guidelines that ‘exceptional hardship’ wasn’t to be taken into account any more.

Ended up with 6 month ban & £800 fine.

EEK! That seems harsh. How fast were you going?

I got an SP30 (41 in a 30 on a duel carriageway) a few years back and paid the fine but couldn’t find my driving license. I ordered a new one and it never arrived. I got in touch and kept them informed about what was going on. Turns out the postie had put my license through next doors letterbox who’d been on holiday for 2 weeks. So I surrendered my license 24 hours too late and so had to go to court.

I explained what had happened and included the communications I’d had keeping them informed as to what was going on

£420 fine + £120 court costs and 4 points

****s!!!

@MoreCashThanDash – viva le revolution! I like it.

@kerley – nope, flat out with the choke out everywhere. I try get maximum velocity past schools at kicking out time. Lap the M25 in under an hour, all that sort of good stuff.

Has it stopped you speeding now?

For 6 months it has

What the hell speed were you doing for it to take two years to process an SP30 and net you an £800 fine? Were you driving an F-15 up the M6?

Can’t even commiserate with a pint as I’m on antibiotics.

Depends entirely on the antibiotic, you might be able to.

If you got 6 months down there for an SP30 then thank god you weren’t in Scotland. That sounds like a custodial up here !lol

Speeding is the new “Heroin dealing to small children” up this way.

We should adopt a modern version of the “sans permit” class of cars, as they have in france. get people out of their Chelsea tractors and into Citreon Ami’s

Now that sounds like a great idea.

Kangaroo court is my experience.
They tried to get started without the clark in the room, the mags didn’t have a clue.
Long story short, I received a ticket in the post, I sent payment and licence off, got a summons in the post for mags court a few weeks later.

Took advice from a mate (Barister), told the court that that I had already had a fine in the post and that I had already sent the payment and my licence off for the three points and the fixed penalty. They couldn’t really do much more in court other than what they had already offered in the first letter. None of them properly understood except the duty solicitor who I spoke to before I went in, neither the Clarke or the duty solicitor were in the room when they started…The Clarke kept having to correct the Mags as they kept dropping the fine and the points until they got down to where they were on the initial letter. My barrister mate told me I should have asked for expenses as I should have never had to go to court in the first place..I wasn’t that cheeky.
Get advice, is my advice. Minimum speak to the duty solicitor.

I have broken the speed laws a couple of times….on the bicycle, and even managed once to set off the flashy thing 😀
They had one in Newton Mearns in Glasgow, at the bottom of a hill and I managed to set it off on the third attempt.

Half the time I reckon these speed cameras are just a way of making money for the council and are set too low. People who consistently seed are mostly doing a lot more than the limit, at least 50% or 60% more, and going over by 5 or 6mph is a bit of a joke, in that the speedometer in cars has to have a bit of leeway.

Roses are red,
I was caught speeding,
I’m sorry your Honour,
It’s guilty I’m pleading.

Half the time I reckon these speed cameras are just a way of making money for the council and are set too low

Except “the council” don’t get the money and smart arse lawyers can get rich clients off by arguing the cameras aren’t calibrated correctly.

But yeah, it’s just a money making war on motorists.

But yeah, it’s just a money making war on motorists.

There are five deaths a day and (I think) 64 serious injuries on British roads every day. The higher the speeds involved, the higher the energy and the worse the injuries.

I am not going to pretend I’ve never sped, but ‘war on motorists’ is, I am afraid, bollocks. There’s a choice here, speed, accept you’re breaking the law and take the (frankly pretty low, given the state of traffic policing) risk of getting done, don’t speed and don’t risk it.

Speeding is not dangerous.

Bad driving is dangerous and driving too fast for the situation is bad driving.

I wish people would accept that instead of this speeding kills mantra, which is bollocks.

(not that I’m stating you are saying that )

I think he was being ironic.

@brads – speeding *is* driving too fast for the situation, it doesn’t matter what *you* think the situation is, the speed limit is there as a maximum, not a target, speed.

And I think that MoreCash was being ironic/sarcastic.

I’m sure Mos won’t mind me saying. It was a totting up ban. He also didn’t have to walk home. I had to pick him up from Skipton 😂

@brads I’m not directly saying that speed is dangerous, what I am saying is that if you are involved in a collision, the outcome is likely to be worse the higher the speed and resulting energy is. There’s some stat (which I wish I could remember the source for, and the exact numbers) but it’s something like cycling on A-roads accounts for about 30% of miles, but 70% of fatalities due to the higher speeds involved.

Clearly, e.g. driving at 70 in fog (which I used to see loads on the M62) is technically legal but us also bloody stupid; also I don’t really see why doing 80 on the motorway (which is about the same as the 130 km/h limit in France) is particularly unsafe but it’s against the law and as above if you’re going to do it, you take the risk of being done.

@MoreCashThanDash I hope I’ve not misinterpreted your post…

@whitestone

Speeding is driving too fast for the limit, not the situation. And the old “target” adage is moot in what I’m discussing.

Almost as bad as “speed kills” (It doesn’t)

Driving too fast for the situation is simply bad driving whatever the speed.

@ratherbeintobago

I got that, and agree about outcome potentially being worse at higher speed, but that applies at slow speeds as well as high speeds.

And I think that MoreCash was being ironic/sarcastic.

Yeah, I forgot the emoji, was responding to dyna-ti, but if you have to explain the joke….🤦‍♂️

12
Magistrates Court for speeding, what ti expect?

(Sic) a good moral kicking on here for starters

I N R A T S

Get up to 12 points then move here to Spain where they take points off you for speeding. Worth a shot…

@mos – come on, spill the beans. What speed in what limit? 🙂

Final offence was 40 in a 30. Maybe fine was commensurate with my salary & mortgage position.
It’s been delayed multiple times because of covid. I’ve been a good boy since it happened.

What the hell speed were you doing for it to take two years to process an SP30 and net you an £800 fine? Were you driving an F-15 up the M6?

Pedantic point, but surely in that case it would have been an SP50? 😉

Why didn’t you just plead guilty by post @Mos?