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How to ask for a Speed Awareness course?
Comments
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If you can't get the sarcasm with the 10mph under then that's on you.
I've posted about it previously & everyone always comes chiming in that they don't go 1mph over the limit.
Absolute nonsense. Out of 50 people maybe 1 or 2 would be telling the truth but the rest would be lying because the vast majority of road users go over here & there.
There's a 40 stretch where I live. Long straight road. Used to be a 50. If it's quiet I still do 50. Not dangerous in the slightest.
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As far as I am aware, speed awareness courses are totally outside the law. there is no legislation covering them being offered or taken. I haven't dissected the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act but I would be very surprised if awareness courses fell within the sections on "Alternatives to Prosecution".
Well, in plain English they're certainly an Alternative to Prosecution - something which you do as an alternative to being prosecuted.
The ROA does offer a slightly unhelpful definition of Alternatives to Prosecution - it basically says that it means the same thing as it does in Scotland.
Moving onto the definition as it applies in Scotland, we find that it is very broad
and includes this section, which would certainly apply to a speed awareness course
has accepted an offer made by a procurator fiscal in respect of the offence to undertake an activity or treatment or to receive services or do any other thing as an alternative to prosecution
the only slight complication being that we don't have procurator fiscals in England. The nearest English equivalent would be the CPS, but fiscals in Scotland also do jobs which in England would be performed by the police; for example they can issue fixed penalties, and they make the charging decision for minor motoring offences like speeding. So the £100 question is whether the reference to a procurator fiscal in Scotland can be read as including an offer from the police in England to undertake an activity or do any other thing as an alternative to prosecution.
Certainly it would make sense for speed awareness courses to be covered by the ROA. Otherwise you end up in the situation where you can drive drunk, at 100 mph, on the run from the police, crash your car, seriously injure or even kill someone, go to prison - and the law declares that a day will eventually come when the slate is wiped clean and your behaviour is no business of your insurer or your employer. However if you get caught doing 80mph on a motorway and go to speedy school for an afternoon, there is no forgiveness and your employer or your insurer can in theory discriminate against you forever as a result. That would feel… not quite right.
Though I suppose if no insurer actually asks about SACs then the question is an academic one anyway.
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I get the sarcasm about 10mph under ok, but you've just made up the stuff about everyone else on MSE never breaking the limit and you being the only person on here ever to admit to doing so.
I'm one who has freely admitted more than once on this forum to breaking the speed limit.
I'm sure there are others too.
I'd be more than a little surprised if anybody here claimed they never drove above the speed limit. Speeding must be the most frequently occurring offence in the UK
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ah yes, clearly you’re more intelligent than the people whose job it is to spot toads that are unsafe at 50 so they reduce it to 40.
you keep doing your stupid driving and endangering others.2 -
Speed limits aren't lowered on the whim of the council/highways agency, they will have looked at the road data e.g. number of crashes, amount of speeding etc and taken action based on that. You don't know it's perfectly safe, you just don't like the limit
Sam Vimes' Boots Theory of Socioeconomic Unfairness:
People are rich because they spend less money. A poor man buys $10 boots that last a season or two before he's walking in wet shoes and has to buy another pair. A rich man buys $50 boots that are made better and give him 10 years of dry feet. The poor man has spent $100 over those 10 years and still has wet feet.
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That used to be the case. However, we now have "blanket" 20 mph limits imposed across whole boroughs, or indeed Wales.
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The 20mph limits are on restricted roads (residential areas and roads with pedestrian areas with streetlights) and were not done on a whim. The 20mph limit is linked to road safety and the benefits in safety are well established, indeed the first guidance (Circular Roads 4/90) came out in 1990. In 2022, 18% of KSI injuries were on 20mph limit zones but account for only 9% of fatal accidents and 16% of seriously injured people. 69% of KSI incidents were on 30mph areas as you'd expect from there being more, but were 69% of deaths and 71% of seriously injured - so 3.5x the amount of incidents but 4.5x as many serious injuries and 7.5x the deaths. All the data shows that they reduce accidents and collisions so very much not on a whim
They were also not done by the council or highways agency but the Senedd
Sam Vimes' Boots Theory of Socioeconomic Unfairness:
People are rich because they spend less money. A poor man buys $10 boots that last a season or two before he's walking in wet shoes and has to buy another pair. A rich man buys $50 boots that are made better and give him 10 years of dry feet. The poor man has spent $100 over those 10 years and still has wet feet.
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Not sure what toads have to do with things.
You two are clearly one of those that spout "it's a limit not a target" which is one of the most ridiculous things anyone had said about driving.
I'll argue all day long that there's nothing dangerous about a speed. Speed never killed anyone. Poor driving is the hazard! Like I say there's a stretch of road here that was 50 for donkeys years. They reduced it to 40. Nothing surrounding the area changed. No houses got built, no nothing. It didn't just magically become 'more dangerous'. 50 was fine yesterday & it's fine now.
"endangering others" what tripe!
Like I said, absolutely nothing wrong with the speed. You're assuming I'm endangering others because I'm going beyond a speed limit without knowing anything further.
Endangering others.
I could do 60 in a 50 on a long straight with nobody else around. Is that endangering others?
And I could do 60 on some narrow potholed country roads, taking bends that I can't see around at 60 because (another phrase that I can't stand like the not a target one) "I know these roads like the back of my hand". I've not broken the speed limit so I guess I mustn't be endangering others?
I drive as the conditions allow and that driving has never had me cause an accident in my life. I don't take bends like an idiot, I don't overtake when something is oncoming. I drive fast when there's good visibility & I overtake when there's ample room to do so.
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It's the policy wording that matters. Some insurers will want to know about points as earn them, some only want to know at renewal unless it results in a totting ban.
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More likely a summons to court
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