We won't reveal camera fines because some are switched off, Buckinghamshire bosses say (From Bucks Free Press)

We won't reveal camera fines because some are switched off, Buckinghamshire bosses say

7:00am Tuesday 3rd August 2010 in

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SPEED camera chiefs have refused to say how much money each device makes – because it would show which ones are switched off.

They refused a Freedom of Information Act request from The Bucks Free Press on the number of tickets issued and fines collected for each camera.

They also claimed it would make the county’s 51 fixed cameras a target for vandals.

This is despite the BFP previously winning a long-running battle to get figures for two cameras – and fines being released elsewhere in England and not being linked to attacks.

It comes as a council chief prepares to reach a decision on camera funding which could see some turned off for good. About £2m in fines were paid from 2007 to 2009.

Attorney General and Beaconsfield MP Dominic Grieve, the chief legal advisor to the Crown, hit out.

He said: “While I appreciate there may be a need not to show which ones are switched off, it would be able to show which speed cameras are collecting the most money.”

Wycombe MP Steve Baker said: “The information should certainly be released.

“We are entering a time when Government needs to be much more open and transparent.”

He said the issue of inactive cameras ‘approaches the question of road safety from the wrong direction’.

He said: “It supposes people will only behave themselves if they are under surveillance.

“We need to get to a situation where people behave themselves on the road because they want to behave themselves on the road.”

We asked for the number of Notice of Intended Prosecutions issued and paid for each camera, in 2007 to 2010. This included the county’s 64 mobile sites.

But the Thames Valley Safer Roads Partnership’s Ellie Hynes said she was ‘not obliged’ to provide the figures as she said they were exempt under the act.

The information risked ‘increased speeding at sites where it is known that a camera is out of use’.

This would ‘expose sites that received no enforcement (often the case in Thames Valley) thereby encouraging speeding where there was no perceived risk of detection’.

She said: “Our own research shows that if a driver believes a camera unit is inactive; speeds at the site will increase.

“Increased speeds mean a higher risk of injury to road users and members of the public.”

And she said: “By releasing the individual camera sites in Buckinghamshire we would [be] effectively advertising to anti-speed camera vandals which cameras they should target.”

This would incur repair and surveillance costs, she said, and pointed to a 2007 News of the World article listing the 100 most busy cameras from available data.

One was hit by an arson attack and she said it is ‘strongly considered’ this was linked to the article.

The Bucks Free Press won a two-year battle with the partnership to get information about two speed cameras on Marlow Hill, High Wycombe, released under the Act.

We appealed to the Information Commissioner, who regulates use of the Act. He backed the partnership – but the BFP then won an appeal at the Information Tribunal.

The figures showed £1.2m worth of fines had been paid with more than 21,000 slapped with tickets between November 2002 and December 2006.

And other speed camera bodies have released figures – and three which disclosed the information within the last year did not link this to attacks.

There were no attacks since the Salford Advertiser published the ‘top 10 cameras’ in June, The Greater Manchester Casualty Reduction Partnership told The Free Press.

Sussex Safer Roads Partnership said there had been two ‘minor incidents’ since The Brighton Argus published figures in October but did not link them with the article.

Dorset Safety Camera Partnership said it released figures regularly in the ‘genuine public interest’ and to cut down on requests.

Spokesman Louise Edwards said: “It is considered that where cameras have been attacked in Dorset the offences against the public safety are being carried out by mindless thugs whenever they feel inclined to do so with no thought to the camera’s location or statistics.”

Buckinghamshire County Council transport boss Cllr Valerie Letheren is yet to announce her decision on its funding for the partnership.

Oxfordshire County Council voted last week to pull its funding, meaning all Oxon cameras were switched off on Sunday.

She has said Bucks is likely to cut funding and manage cameras itself, turning some off.

The TVSRP did, however, release the number of tickets paid in Buckinghamshire, 12,125 in 2009. Tickets are £60, meaning tickets were worth £727,500.

This means that between 2007 and 2010, the partnership was paid fines worth £2m.

But just 44 per cent of tickets issued were paid. Many are offered a ‘speed awareness course’ instead of points and fine.

The partnership recently hailed a fall in deaths and collisions in its ten-year lifetime, from 33 in 2000 to 23.

Those killed or seriously injured fell from 396 in 2000 to 242 in 2009. The total number of people involved in collisions fell from 2,884 to 1,960 from 2000.