Tens of thousands of motorists have avoiding speeding penalties because a fault with some enforcement cameras on major motorways and A-roads has not been fixed for almost a year.
The fault, first identified in October, means that police have not been issuing penalty tickets to motorists caught by certain speed cameras on some of the country’s busiest roads, says The Times.
In the hope of deterring offending motorists, the affected cameras still flash when they detect a speeding driver but breaches are not enforced because police do not have confidence in the current technology.
Last year, a “technical anomaly” was identified with 154 speed cameras used on all smart motorways, including parts of the M25, M1, M5 and M6, and some A-roads.
It meant that there was a small delay in the link between the enforcement cameras and the variable speed limit signs, meaning that some drivers were incorrectly clocked as speeding after the limit displayed on the gantry had changed.
National Highways said that it had identified 2,650 instances of “erroneous camera activations” since 2021 but police forces across the country were so concerned that they cancelled more than 36,000 ongoing and historic speeding cases related to the cameras.
At the time the government apologised, launched a review and said that a fix for the faulty cameras had been agreed. However, more than ten months after the national issue was identified, the malfunctioning cameras are still being put through testing by the Home Office and have not yet been approved for use by the department.
While they wait for approval, police forces across the country are not issuing any enforcement notices for speeding motorists caught by the faulty cameras until they have full confidence in the system.
This is because they want to ensure no driver is incorrectly prosecuted and are aware that any fines, penalty points or driving bans could be easily challenged and overturned in the courts.
The decision was made by forces when the initial camera fault was identified and will remain in place until Home Office approval is obtained. It is not clear when this will be
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