Just like the hypocrisy of governments bleating about endemic gambling while constantly increasing the amount of poker machines and other forms of punting and allowing more than fifty people per day to die of tobacco related illness while reaping billions of dollars from tobacco taxes, it is obvious that government road strategies are implemented not to save lives, but to extract the maximum amount of money possible from motorists in the form of fines. Motorists are targeted because people have to drive and they are easy to prey upon. The whole system of fixed traffic cameras and current police road "enforcement" tactics is just another form of blatant taxation, nothing more.
Instead of making their presence felt throughout the roads as a deterrent to dangerous driving practices, the police act merely as government revenue raisers. This is easily proven by observing and analysing their methods. For instance, whenever a well-marked police vehicle is easily seen on the road, the behaviour of motorists immediately and dramatically changes. They slow down to the speed limit and drive very safely and carefully. In other words, there is no doubt whatsoever that the greatest deterrent to unsafe driving is a visible police presence on the roads.
However what do the police do? The exact opposite! They hide behind bushes and billboards with radar and laser guns and book speeding motorists, gathering tens of millions of dollars per year in revenue from infringements. If the police really wanted to stop speeders, the mere presence of marked police cars on the roads would achieve this immediately, but of course this does not produce any revenue. And why do police persist in using unmarked cars? The obvious and only logical explanation is that this also allows them to raise revenue by booking motorists who would certainly not be speeding if the police had made their presence felt by patrolling in marked cars. In other words, what the police are doing is entrapment, not enforcement, purely for the purpose of collecting revenue.
Radar detectors are banned in most states of Australia, but for all the wrong reasons. Many international studies have shown that motorists using radar detectors have far less accidents than those who do not have these devices. An analysis in the US state of Virginia by a group called Stop The Virginia Radar Detector Ban that is fighting to overturn the ban on radar detectors, makes the following very valid points that I have modified slightly to correlate with Australian circumstances:
After examining the many studies around the world about radar detectors, the only conclusion that a person could draw is that they are banned only because they are devices that reduce revenue from infringement notices, not reduce the road fatality rate. It is obvious that if motorists were warned of a police presence using radar speed guns, those motorists would slow down and drive carefully, just as if they were in the presence of marked police cars on the road. But of course this would not have the desired effect of maintaining the cash cow of speeding fines, so the police still act as government revenue-raisers by hiding behind billboards and trees and driving in unmarked cars instead of making their presence felt.
It is an offence to flash high beam headlights at oncoming motorists within 100 metres. The reason given by police is that flashing high beams may dazzle oncoming motorists, creating a hazard. This is a complete load of baloney, because during the day, people can tolerate much higher levels of light intensity because their irises are closed more than at night. So momentarily high beams would have literally no effect on drivers, but the offence was created to stop drivers being warned of speed traps, so that the revenue stream from speeding tickets would not be jeopardised.
How on earth can the government justify making it illegal for motorists to inform other drivers to slow down to the speed limit? This idiotic law about flashing headlights merely proves for once and for all that police speed traps are indeed revenue raisers and have no intention of trying to reduce the road toll by deterring speeding drivers. For instance, if I flashed a light at a speeding driver and he slowed down to the speed limit, I would achieve a lot more for road safety than a bunch of cops hiding in the bushes with radar guns.
It may be illegal to flash high beams at oncoming motorists, but obviously if low beams are flashed rapidly, there is no chance of dazzling oncoming drivers. Thus it is not a hazard and cannot be a bookable offence. Drivers who really want to help their fellow motorists to avoid being entrapped by police radar can easily wire a momentary pushbutton switch to their low beam switch that can be used to flash their low beams. If pulled over by police for flashing lights, drivers can easily demonstrate that they flashed their low beams, not causing oncoming drivers to be dazzled and thus beating any booking.
As far as I am aware, it is not illegal to carry a torch in the car and flash it at oncoming motorists. So as a service to your fellow motorists and to stay within the law, keep a torch in your car and use it to warn oncoming motorists of speed traps. Those high-intensity LED torches are ideal for this purpose, as they are small and convenient, the LEDs never burn out and the batteries seem to last forever. These torches are not bright enough to dazzle oncoming drivers, so flashing them to warn of speed traps could not possibly be illegal.
Police using radar and laser speed guns are often observed in 40kph school zones, invariably positioned at the departure end of such zones. Logic dictates that this method of "speed zone enforcement" is another blatant form of revenue raising that actually risks the lives of schoolchildren. If the police wanted to deter motorists from speeding though school zones, they would place police cars BEFORE the entry points to those zones and illuminate their roof signs to indicate that the zones were active and warn motorists to slow down. Such highly visible indicators on police cars BEFORE the zones would virtually guarantee that every motorist would slow down to the 40kph speed limit, however it would also mean that none of them would be booked and thus the state would not receive the revenue from such bookings.
So police place themselves at the departure ends of school zones and book hapless motorists who do not notice the often obscure school zone signs or fail to note the time when these zones are active. This has become a massive cash cow for the state government, however it does not protect the very people who are most at risk, the schoolchildren. Imagine the scenario if a motorist sped through a school zone and struck and killed a schoolchild, when there was a policeman at the far end of the zone with a speed gun waiting to trap and book him? It would be far too late for the dead child and the alleged "speed zone enforcement" that the police claim they are enforcing with such tactics will have done nothing whatsoever to save that child. If that police car had been placed before the zone, with illuminated warnings, then that child would have most certainly remained alive.
It is only a matter of time before such a terrible event happens and the police and the state will not be able to wriggle out of the public outrage or to justify these blatant revenue raising tactics any more. Unfortunately it will mean that an innocent child will die to make the point.
If state governments really wanted to make school zones safe for children at the allocated times, then every school zone sign would be fitted with bright flashing lights that would indicate the hours of operation, thus alerting motorists to slow to 40kph. However this has two drawbacks for governments, firstly the cost of installing flashing lights on all school zone signs. But what seems to be the most important reason that governments have been so slow to do this is that massive amounts of revenue would be lost if motorists were warned to slow down in those zones and thus not be booked for speeding.
It is blatantly obvious that although state governments constantly issue propaganda about how much they care for the safety of schoolchildren, their tardiness in installing warning lights at those school zones shows that the revenue raised from booking motorists in them is far more important than saving lives.
One morning at around 9:00am, I was driving along Blaxland Road in Epping, when I observed a policeman with a radar speed gun at the departure end of a 40kph school zone. He was booking motorists who had been exceeding the speed limit through the zone. I thought to myself that this was preposterous and dangerous, as instead of trying to prevent motorists from speeding in that zone in the first place, this policeman preferred to allow them to transgress and risk the lives of schoolchildren so that he could book them.
I was infuriated by this blatant disregard for the safety of the children by this policeman, but I was not in a position to stop and have some words with him on the spot, so when I came home later that day, I immediately sent a letter to the local area commander, complaining of the idiotic and risky methods used by this policeman to book motorists while blatantly refusing to act to reduce the danger to schoolchildren.
The local area commander replied with a pile of the most flimsy excuses that I had ever heard, trying to defend the technique that I observed one of his officers was using to book motorists. He claimed that this technique was "enforcement" of the speed laws and that it saved lives. When I pointed out to him that this policeman literally allowed motorists to speed through that school zone and endanger children, merely so he could book them, the commander had no answer. When I pointed out that if that same policeman and his marked vehicle were stationed at the approach end of the school zone, motorists would slow down to the speed limit and reduce the risk for children in that zone, the commander had no answer again.
It was obvious to me by the response from this local area commander that he had been instructed to fob off any complaints about this disgusting form of blatant revenue raising at the risk of killing or injuring schoolchildren. It just goes to show the utter rapaciousness of the State Government's chase for the dollar, when police are instructed to act as tax collectors by using methods that put money above the lives of children.
Not only that, positive proof periodically emerges that shows that police are given booking quotas to fulfil. In other words, they must actively book a certain amount of people per month, whether they need to be booked or not. Of course this leads to situations where, if the quota happens to be low at one particular time, police will issue infringements for the most trivial or even unsubstantiated charges, knowing that most motorists are either ignorant of the law or their rights and do not have the resources or knowledge to fight such travesties and will just pay the fines and write them off as bad experiences.
Motorists should always ensure that they stand up for their rights and not be bullied into accepting unjust infringement notices. It is most important for motorists to know that they are not required to volunteer information to police if they are pulled over, apart from producing their driver licences and stating their name and address. Anything said to police can be used as evidence, therefore motorists should always resist temptation and apart from stating their name and address, refuse to say anything whatsoever. Even if motorists know that they were speeding or committing some other offence, quite often infringement notices will have errors on them that will invalidate them completely, thus saving motorists money and demerit points.
This is not to say that motorists should try everything to evade being penalised for committing offences, but in many cases, motorists have been booked unjustly and in such cases, should use every legal means at their disposal to fight the bookings and get them withdrawn or dismissed in court.
I had a nasty experience some years ago that demonstrates a blatantly unfair and totally unjustified booking. I was driving on Victoria Road in Gladesville and made a U-turn at a break in the median strip. There was no sign prohibiting this, therefore what I did was perfectly legal.
Five minutes later, about two kilometres from where I made this U-turn, I was pulled over by a police car and no less than a sergeant jumped out and started to berate me. He stated that I had committed an illegal U-turn on Victoria Road and that I was going to be booked for that. He claimed that I had impeded traffic by slowing down to make that U-turn. He started asking me questions, which I refused to answer. I gave him my name and address and produced my licence and the only thing I stated to him was that I was going to contest the infringement. The policeman wrote out the ticket, handed it to me and left, after making some snide remarks about me not having any chance of beating this alleged offence.
I immediately drove home, collected my camera and went to the place where I had made this U-turn and took photographs in every direction, clearly showing that making U-turns was quite legal in that spot. I then wrote a letter to the Commissioner of Police, stating that:
I also complained bitterly about this sergeant being belligerent and that he tried (unsuccessfully) to bully me into admitting that I had committed an offence. I demanded that the Police Commissioner reprimand this sergeant and I also demanded that that the infringement be immediately withdrawn or I would take the matter to court, beat it on at least three valid legal grounds and then I would launch civil proceedings against this sergeant for harassment and abuse of his power, as well as sue for damages from the NSW Police Force in general.
A letter arrived within a few days from the Commissioner, withdrawing the infringement and apologising profusely for the entire incident, also stating that the sergeant had been reprimanded. I was pleased that justice was seen to be done and that one very authoritarian police officer was reminded that he was a servant of the people, not their master.
This incident demonstrates that police occasionally want to take the law into their own hands, however in such cases, motorists should always stand up for themselves. They should ensure that they don't give ammunition to police by admitting anything, but just assess the situation, take notes and evidence where possible and see if the bookings were deserved. If they were not justified, motorists should fight tooth and nail to have them quashed.
With inexpensive mobile phones with built-in cameras being readily available, all motorists should have them and take plenty of photos whenever they are pulled over and booked. No amount of verbal argument in court is better than even one clear photo. Police get it wrong on many occasions and motorists need to gather as much hard evidence as possible to prove that they were wrongly booked. Do not be intimidated by police trying to stop you taking photographs, as you are legally entitled to do this.
Another more esoteric technique is to have a GPS navigator with logging facility running all the time. If a motorist with such a device is booked for speeding, when in fact he was not, then a printout from the logging recorder can be tendered to the court as evidence to show that at the time of the booking, the motorist was indeed driving at or below the speed limit. Thus the motorist would have adequate grounds to take civil legal action against the police.
When pulled over by police, REMEMBER THIS - Anything you say can be used against you as evidence in court. This is what you should do.
Speed has been blamed more than most other factors that cause fatal accidents, but there is nothing wrong with driving quickly, provided that certain criteria are met. If the road is of a high standard, the vehicle is modern, well handling and has excellent tyres and if the driver is competent, sober and well-trained in handling a car in emergencies such as skids, then driving at 160kph or more on most good freeways such as the Sydney to Melbourne divided highway poses no reduction in safety at all. This is easily proven by statistics.
Germany's road toll is similar to that of Australia, but there is no speed limit whatsoever on German autobahns and in many cases the weather conditions are much worse in Europe than in Australia. Therefore speeding in itself cannot be blamed for our road toll and it is ludicrous to see unrealistic limits of 110kph on freeways that are capable of accommodating modern safe vehicles travelling at almost double that speed. In fact in the recent 2000 holiday period, the only area that did not sustain any road deaths was the Northern Territory, where there was still no speed limit on open roads.
It is most apparent that a major change in policy and the application of the law to motorists needs to be implemented. Governments require money to operate, but if it is at the expense of road deaths, this is far too high a price to pay. Police must be prevented from acting as government tax collectors and must do their job of deterring errant motorists by showing a high profile on the roads in marked cars instead of skulking behind bushes or in disguised vehicles. Speed cameras should be abolished, as they do not deter speeders, but just act as revenue raisers. Red-light cameras have been proven to be completely ineffective and in fact contribute to accidents at intersections, so they should be removed forthwith.
Every motorist has the means to beat those revenue raisers easily. Just go and get a GPS and say goodbye to being booked by traffic cameras and of course do not accumulate those demerit points that can result in licence loss.