Speeding offences in Kent drop to 76,000 in 2023 but police say it's too high

KentOnline / KMTV

In a ride-along with two officers, they pulled over three drivers for speeding.

Transcript

00:00 Do you realise the key in the moment?

00:02 I think there's three points on it.

00:04 What were they for?

00:05 Speeding.

00:06 Kent Police are cracking down on motorists not sticking to the rules of the roads, as

00:11 almost 80,000 were caught speeding in Kent in 2023.

00:16 While speeding is down from the previous year, it's only dropped by around 2.5%.

00:22 So for the past four years, the number of motorists speeding has dropped, but Kent Police

00:27 say it's still too high.

00:29 We went on a ride along with officers around North Kent in an unmarked vehicle, and in

00:34 the space of around an hour and a half, we caught three people not following the speed

00:40 limits.

00:41 On the motorway we've seen you driving, you're up very close to the car in front, quite intimidating

00:45 to them as well.

00:46 Any reason for that?

00:47 He's been going down quite a busy carriageway at that time, it's 92 miles an hour, not only

00:54 due to the speed, but the manner of driving that we observed as well.

00:59 We are behind other vehicles, we are tailgating them, we're trying to bully our way past them.

01:04 He has already been caught for speeding in the past, and as we said sometime, the attitude

01:10 of it is, well no one's been killed tonight.

01:13 The first offender was caught along the M20, just one of many caught speeding on Kent's

01:18 motorways.

01:19 In a Freedom of Information request, KMTV uncovered that more than 1,000 were caught

01:25 exceeding the 70 mile per hour limit on motorways just last year.

01:29 But this data shows actually the number of motorists going over the 70 limit has dropped

01:34 in the past five years.

01:36 Officers want to see this number coming down even more.

01:40 Not long after, we caught another going almost 70 in a 50 limit.

01:45 We're going to try and position ourselves behind the vehicle at a constant maintained

01:49 gap.

01:50 Here we are, 50 mile an hour limit, and we're pushing 70 miles an hour.

02:04 And I dare say he's getting faster still.

02:10 He could now be facing three points and a £100 fine.

02:14 They also caught another driver along the Ashton Way too, a spot police say is notorious

02:20 for speeding.

02:21 So we've pulled him over and spoken to him.

02:23 He hasn't got any points, never been stopped before for speeding.

02:26 We're aware that police operate on that bit of road, but figured that because it's empty,

02:31 no one's ahead of him, it's quite safe to exceed the speed limit.

02:34 I've obviously advised him that that isn't the case, and he'll be receiving paperwork

02:39 through the post in due course, and potentially receive three points and a fine.

02:43 The road with the highest number of offenders last year was the M25 in Swanley.

02:48 Whereas between 2019 and 2022, the Kent road facing the most offenders was the Dartford

02:54 Crossing.

02:55 We work with partners for not just enforcement that the police does, but we work with education,

02:59 we work with engagement to understand why people do this.

03:02 And I think a lot of the feedback we get is people don't realise the consequences, or

03:06 people do think that our speed enforcement is just to make revenue, which isn't the case.

03:11 It is about safety, but people are blind to that.

03:14 They don't realise until it's happened to them or someone they know, they just don't

03:18 take the severity of speeding and the situations that it can cause.

03:23 While the majority of speeding is captured on cameras, some of which is officer issued,

03:28 using a speed one, we caught a few not sticking to the rules along the roadside.

03:33 This is another piece of equipment that the police are often relying on, trying to catch

03:37 people speeding out and about on the road.

03:40 This is a 30 mile per hour road and sometimes they'll catch up to 20 people speeding here

03:45 in one hour.

03:46 Let's see what we can catch.

03:47 That person's going 42, 27, 29, 41.

03:54 So as you can see, you catch quite a few people out and about.

03:59 Most people will slow down once they've seen you with the device.

04:03 While speeding on the whole has dropped in the past five years, officers say a 2% drop

04:08 last year just isn't enough and say they remain committed to driving down speeding across

04:13 Kent.

04:14 Sophia Akin for KMTV.

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