COUNTY council leader Keith Mitchell asks for one good reason why he should not scrap speed cameras.
Well, ROSPA offers a hundred such reasons, because that is the number of lives that they suggest speed cameras save nationally each year.
I doubt that will sway Mr Mitchell, so perhaps he will be convinced by findings which show that speed cameras have been saving £400m a year in casualty and accident costs since 2007 alone – with up to 32 per cent fewer fatalities a year at camera sites.
And that is just the financial side of the equation. There is no cost benefit analysis which can calculate the very real cost in human misery resulting from road accidents.
What is particularly worrying in Mr Mitchell’s attitude is his simplistic disregard for human misery which results from traffic accidents.
He appears driven by the simplistic resentment that central government receives the revenue which speed cameras raise, not the county council. What a selfish, blinkered attitude.
There is, of course, another reason why speed cameras are important, and that is the part that they play in encouraging drivers to respect the law.
In 2009, speed cameras in Oxfordshire identified more than 50,000 drivers who thought that the law did not apply to them.
One wonders how this figure will increase to the detriment of us all now that the cameras are no longer there.
The scrapping of speed cameras will not only erode respect for speed limits, it will lead to a weakening of the law in general.
Brian M Leahy, Hanney Road, Steventon, Abingdon IN reply to Keith Mitchell, I can think of one very obvious reason why it makes sense for Oxfordshire’s council taxpayers to spend £600,000 on operating speed cameras, even if the fines are collected by the Government.
Oxfordshire’s council taxpayers are also national taxpayers, and it is not very clever to save yourself £600,000 in council tax if it is costing you £1m extra in national taxes to achieve it. If Mr Mitchell were fighting the Government for speeding fines to be returned to the county, or at the very least, for the cost of operating the cameras to be paid out of the fines received, I would happily support him (although I suspect his voice would carry more weight with the Government he professes to support than mine ever will).
But he seems interested only in making the council budget look good, regardless of the fact that it will cost taxpayers more in national taxes than they will save in council tax. It is, quite literally, a Con trick.
CHRIS ROBINS, Foxdown Close, Kidlington
Comments: Our rules
We want our comments to be a lively and valuable part of our community - a place where readers can debate and engage with the most important local issues. The ability to comment on our stories is a privilege, not a right, however, and that privilege may be withdrawn if it is abused or misused.
Please report any comments that break our rules.
Read the rules here