Opinion: is it time to rethink our speed camera policy?

Car launches are strange but wonderful things. A tense battle of wits between PRs and journalists played out in stunning locations. Every detail is meticulously planned, from the road route to the seating plan for dinner and, of course, the strategy to position the car just as the manufacturer foresees. There are always one or two lines that appear time and again, drumming the key message into the brains of motoring journalists.

Of course, sometimes these trips allow extra latitude. One that springs to mind was way back in 2004, where as a fresh faced 12 year old I was flown to Australia for the ‘Vauxhall’ Monaro launch. A rebadged Holden fitted with a 5.7-litre V8 and shot through with an infectious Aussie sense of humour, there wasn’t much ‘positioning’ required. Vauxhall knew it would sell in small numbers but just wanted something cool for its showrooms. A request to leave the official programme centred around Melbourne, head to Bathurst and eventually drop the car off in Sydney, was approved in seconds.

Suffice to say, it was an amazing trip. However, I left with a crushing conclusion. Australia was a broken nation. The proliferation of speed cameras and the invasive ‘speed is evil and will result in certain death’ messaging had resulted in everyone sticking to absurdly conservative speed limits at all costs. All those lovely V8s doing 109kph on wide, perfectly surfaced and sparsely trafficked motorways and considerably less on rural roads even in places where humans were barely present.

Well, it’s taken a couple of decades but the UK has arrived at this depressing destination. The vast network of cameras, the complete lack of discretion, the almost non-existence of actual human traffic enforcement and the bizarre, inconsistent ‘variable speed limits’ that seem designed purely to catch people out have meant our motorways now crawl mindlessly at 67mph. Nobody willing to move over. Nobody paying attention to anything but gantry signs that might randomly say ‘50’ for no reason. We, too, are a broken people.

I’m just back from a weekend run to Heathrow. A warm, dry journey on a Sunday morning. Yet I was restricted to 50 for about 35 miles. In fact, at one point successive gantries displayed 50, 60, 50, 50, 60, 60, 50. By the fifth gantry there was additional information, ‘Report of obstruction’. There was no obstruction. Frustrating? Yes. But if I’d have broken the limit, I’d be duly handed a fine and three points. Even though the limit was set for a fictional scenario.

Now, I’m all for enforcement. And sensible, rational speed limits. But we have become desensitised to ever tighter restrictions, many of which don’t seem rooted in logic or data. The speed debate is a difficult one, as saying “I want to drive faster” sounds selfish and hardly a basis for a nuanced conversation. However, the natural conclusion of our current path is blanket 20mph speed limits and millions of generally right-thinking people being treated like pariahs. Governance is meant to be by consent, isn’t it? I’m familiar with railing against the PR machine on launches but how do you sensibly tackle this national issue? Answers on a postcard...