Cycling and the Justice System - public inquiry

thistle (MBNW) wrote:

Just had an email to say this has been published:
https://allpartycycling.files.wordpress ... t-2017.pdf

The email said thanks for submitting evidence, but my name's not on the list of acknowledgements in the back so hopefully they read it :roll:

Ditto, and er, ditto.
So I guess they didn't read it.

Finished reading it, there is some real rubbish in there, that is shocking!
While the intention is good I have some concerns that the inaccuracies will harm its impact somewhat.

Two bits that stand out instantly are
"However, up to a third of drivers who receive 12 points - or sometimes even more - escape any form of disqualification by pleading ‘exceptional hardship’ in court (Mustafa, 2011)."
Read the report ( http://www.onepaper.co.uk/JAM%20Excepti ... rdship.pdf ) and what it actually says is
"At least one third of these made an application to reduce their disqualification period due to mitigating circumstances, “exceptional hardship” being the argument most commonly presented."
Application and its acceptance are different!

Another is
"The length of time required by the Police to serve a Notice of Intended Prosecution for a road traffic offence is currently just 14 days and must be extended. This period is too short to enable many cases to be adequately processed and in some cases may enable offenders to escape justice"
Simply put its Hogwash, the NIP can be sent as soon as the allegation is made, the Police will also need to write to the registered keeper to find out who the driver was and that can be done at the same time, simply put any failing to get a NIP out in 14 days is entirely the failure of the Police. I have seen many NIP's for minor traffic offences easily served within 14 days (and if there is a collision none is needed anyway).
Additionally the NIP limit of 14 days is designed to inform a potential accused in a timely manner while they may still remember the incident in the interests of justice and while I know this is a cycling forum, I see no VALID reason to change that, no investigation is needed, just send the darn thing!