Speeding offences fall, says LJMU School of Law

An analysis of motoring offences conducted by Liverpool John Moores University and the RAC Foundation has shown a 12% decrease in speeding offences in Merseyside.

Dr Adam Snow from LJMU and Doreen Lam of the RAC Foundation used data from the Home Office to present a number of changes in motor offences from 2017-19.

In England and Wales alone 2.8 million motoring offences were detected in 2018-19.

Speeding offences accounted for 84% of the figure, which is a 4% increase from the previous year and 37% higher than figures collected in 2011-12.

Of the speeding offences detected in 2018-19:

• 44% resulted in the offender being sent on a speed awareness course

• 34% attracted fixed penalty notices (FPNs)

• 12% were later cancelled

• 10% resulted in court action

Results for Merseyside showed that there were 53,112 speeding offences detected from 2018-19 which is 12% less than the previous year of 60,681.

The study also found that 70% of all motoring offences in Merseyside were related to speeding and 86% of those were detected by camera.

West Yorkshire had the highest number of speeding offences in 2018-19 with 181,867 people caught speeding. Wiltshire had none because it removed speed cameras from its roads in 2010!

Co-author Dr Adam Snow of LJMU’s School of Law is a leading expert in traffic crime and teaches in the area of criminal law.

Steve Gooding of the RAC Foundation said both motorists and road managers had a responsibility around speed; “Where limits are properly signposted and clearly feel right for the road in question then motorists have no excuse for going faster, but that means highway authorities also have a responsibility to make sure the limits they set are appropriate and to avoid instances where the limit repeatedly ‘bounces’ up and down along a single stretch.”

In 2018, “exceeding the speed limit” was recorded as a contributory factor in 13% of fatal crashes in Great Britain where at least one factor was identified.