James May on speed cameras

Theoretically, or so we're told, if you put all the components of a typewriter in a box and shake it for long enough, it will eventually reassemble itself.

I'm not convinced. For one thing, it would probably take a very long time to happen, and someone would have to be watching, because the same theory says that the assembled typewriter would then start taking itself to bits again. It would be a right bummer if you waited four million years for your Remington Excelsior to come together only for it to come apart again, unnoticed, while you were having a quick waz.

Similarly, and sticking with typewriters, if you sit an infinite number of monkeys at them for long enough one of them will eventually produce Tennyson's Idylls of the King, apparently. Stands to reason, really; the number of combinations of letters and spaces must be finite, but infinity, being what it is, is infinite. Presumably, Tennyson would come out of monkeyville like sausages.

But at the same time it's all sort of cobblers, because it's the manipulation of arithmetic, which is great for adding things up, but really only another language for helping us to understand things, and not quite the same thing as the truth.

Maths abuse is all around us. It can be found in surveys, financial reports, the analysis of train punctuality and - and this is the point I'm really working towards - the Great Gatso Debate.

First, a caveat. Anything expressed as a percentage or in the form of a graph should be treated with a great deal of suspicion, because these things are used to help the author illustrate the point he or she wants to make, which is not necessarily the same thing as what happened.

For example, I recently read that Land Rover sales have soared by 45 per cent. From what? I seem to remember them going down. Let's say you sold 100 Land Rovers in 2007, but 45 per cent fewer in 2008. That means you shifted 55. If sales increased by 45 per cent for 2009 things are sounding good, but you've only actually sold 80. Um, that's not as many.

"Gatsos are obviously for making money and not saving lives, but that’s because the fines aren’t high enough"

I've seen a graph plotting revenue from speed cameras against the decrease in road casualties. The fines soar, and the casualty rate barely wavers from the straight and level. Then again, this graph was produced by the anti-Gatso lobby. You could rescale the axis and make the revenue barely leave the deck while the rate of death plummets like one of those pianos that keep landing on Morris Marinas. Both are accurate, and both are sort of bollocks as well.

Here's the thing. I've never heard a good statistical case made in favour of speed cameras, but I've never heard a really robust one made against them, either. They're all flawed and fairly easy to knock down.

Take the famous M11 Gatso. It netted a record bag of money, but the casualties went up, proving that it doesn't work. Then again, they went down for a bit, proving that it does. I imagine the volume of traffic on the M11 has changed over the five years under investigation, and so has the definition of ‘casualty'. Once it meant you had to be cut free by the fire brigade, but now it might mean you got a bit of a shock when the airbag went off. So there is more than one variable here making the whole thing quite literally unscientific.

Speed cameras are obviously for making money and not for saving lives, but that's only because the fines aren't high enough. Obviously they're not, because people are still speeding. That's why they're getting nabbed. If you apply my ‘Radio 4' test to this subject - does your case stand up if you're invited on to the Today Programme to explain yourself - then both sides of the debate look pretty feeble.

But do you know what this is, above all other things? Chuffing boring. I'm sick to death of it, and I've decided that the only way to deal with speed cameras is not to get caught.

I think this is quite easy. If you've got half a brain you'll have worked out where the cameras are likely to be. Admittedly you can't do much about the camera vans that appear on B-roads and make you wonder why we sacrificed so many lives to defeat fascism, but the fixed ones are exactly where you'd expect, and yellow. Just go slowly there, and give it the beans when you're out of harm's way.

This is what I do. Contrary to popular belief, I do spend quite a bit of time going too fast, and I've had a clean licence since 1998.

Now watch me get my ass royally busted.