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Motoring news

Fines more likely for speeding abroad

01/10/2009

Motorists who speed while driving abroad are now more likely to face fines, after a new European treaty came into force today.

Under the treaty, British drivers who commit offences punishable by a fixed penalty will have their details passed to UK authorities, who can collect and keep the fine.

The arrangement is part of the framework for the Mutual Recognition of Financial Penalties, which also applies to other fixed-penalty offences such as those relating to public disorder.

Although the treaty also covers foreign nationals who commit offences within the UK, current exchange rates mean that the standard £60 fixed-penalty for speeding falls below the agreement's 70-euro threshold.

In this way, foreign drivers who speed in the UK cannot currently be pursued for the penalty in their home country due to sterling's relative weakness.

While in practice this means that speeding fines issued in the UK to foreign drivers will not be pursued by any of the other 13 states, the Government is set to benefit from British citizens' offences when driving abroad.

"Either the Government is worried about speeding foreign drivers or it isn't," a spokesperson for the RAC Foundation told The Telegraph.

"The new scheme should not be left floundering because of fluctuating exchange rates.

"If British motorists are being chased for offences committed overseas, what are they supposed to think when they then see European visitors to these shores escaping scot-free?"