From H Morris.
MAY I make a plea to both the Chief of Police and the States NOT to blindly follow the UK in introducing fixed-penalty notices for speeding.

In my view this will inevitably lead to a massive loss of both confidence in and respect for the police by the general public.

This is exactly what has happened in the UK as a result of the ludicrous criminalisation of the public by the police use of speed cameras and penalty notices.

The Police Chief, Graham Power, tells us that speeding is near the top of the public’s list of concerns in Jersey, but I simply do not believe that this assertion is based on a proper survey. In pub conversations or dinner parties I have never heard such a topic mentioned, although all other issues of interest and concern to Jersey folk are regularly raised and discussed.

The fact is that the law should be interpreted by the police using good old-fashioned common sense. This dictates that you do not seek to make a criminal out of someone travelling quite safely but inadvertently at, say, 35 mph in a 30 mph zone or 47 mph along the Victoria Avenue dual carriageway.

These speed limits were set by a committee which I would suggest has no divine right of judgment of what is a safe or unsafe speed for a particular location or driving conditions, and they probably set the limit in an age when they expected common sense to be applied to any misdemeanour.

Most people understand that a fixed-penalty notice is just a money-making exercise in the UK which has absolutely nothing to do with public safety but is a legalised method of highway robbery by the state.

In case any of your readers are wondering, I have not had a single speeding conviction in either Jersey or the UK in the last quarter of a century, although I have driven hundreds of thousands of miles.

I do, however, currently have a great respect for the Jersey police and I do not want to see the scenes we saw recently in the UK repeated in Jersey, where two officers who reprimanded a litter lout in Croydon were promptly set upon by many members of the passing public.

Routinely criminalising the motorist is the surest route to the loss of respect for the rule of law, which should always be applied sensibly, not in a draconian manner.
Rochez,
Les Ruisseaux,
St Brelade.