The Institute of Advanced Motorists (IAM) has called for the UK and Europe to work together to ensure overseas drivers are adequately punished if they break the speed limit.<\/p>\n
According to the organisation, speeding offences committed by foreign drivers in Britain are not being pursued because they are not registered with the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency.<\/p>\n
Neil Greig, director of policy and research at the IAM, has therefore urged the UK to join up with the rest of Europe to "harmonise motoring offences and give the police extra powers to pursue dangerous drivers".<\/p>\n
He noted that progress on this issue has been extremely slow, which means thousands of drivers have been able to avoid fines and bans "simply because their cars cannot easily be traced".<\/p>\n
Figures from the IAM show that since January 2013, drivers from other countries have escaped £2.3 million worth of speeding tickets in England and Wales.<\/p>\n
The statistics, obtained through a freedom of information request to police authorities, revealed that this was a particularly big problem in Thames Valley.<\/p>\n
Indeed, a reported 3,580 offences were committed by overseas drivers in this area, with one individual travelling at 102 mph in a 70 mph zone.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, 2,477 reported offences were committed by motorists from other countries in Merseyside during this period, along with 2,152 in Warwickshire.<\/p>\n
In Gwent, 2,090 instances of foreign drivers breaking the speed limit were reported, and 1,954 similar offences were committed in Kent.<\/p>\n
Many speeding motorists from abroad are also going too fast in the Greater London area. A total of 1,586 offences were recorded in this part of the country, with one driver notching up a speed of 98 mph on a road where the maximum permitted speed is 50 mph.<\/p>\n
Posted by Fred Mason<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Institute of Advanced Motorists (IAM) has called for the UK and Europe to work together to ensure overseas drivers are adequately punished if they break the speed limit. According to the organisation, speeding offences committed by foreign drivers in Britain are not being pursued because they are not registered with the Driver and Vehicle […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5892,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2264","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-motoring-issues"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n