Driving ban

[denisegordon]

My husband is getting a driving ban tomorrow for reaching 12 points for speeding (which I don't condone in any way!). The court will only not ban him if he can show extreme hardship and they say losing your job is not extreme enough. We know of other drivers who have more than 12 points and have just had a telling off and a fine - is it just bad luck as to how strictly each court enforces the rules? He was 2 weeks short of having 6 points expired when he got stopped.

It is an Inverness court.

[jake-the-peg]

2 weeks short, that's tough.

Better if he can claim others will suffer, so if for example he did anything like run youth groups or charity work that he'd be unable to do without a car.

[flip-flop]

Particularly tough if the convictions were from those static tax collection devices that the Guardianistas of the world laughingly refer to as 'safety' cameras.

As jake says, other people relying on him, elderly relatives for example, will have more sway.

Just as a side issue, I recall reading recently that consideraation was going to be given to downgrading the penalty if caught by the piggy banks to 2 penalty points. Its a start I suppose.

If he was caught by these devices, I really hope he escapes a ban.

[denisegordon]

flip-flop, that's interesting what you say about downgrading points. Before the cameras you had to be a really bad driver to get a ban, but it's going to be really common now.

[JudgeJ]

I believe the law is the same in Scotland as in England and Wales. The Road Traffic Regulation Act (1984) states that a minimum disqualification of six months must be imposed by magistrates when a driver accumulates twelve or more points within three years. The magistrates have no discretion (save in the �exceptional hardship� circumstances you mention). It is therefore not a matter of luck and the stories you have heard of people with twelve points being given a telling off and allowed to keep their licences must therefore be false.

For exceptional hardship to be pleaded it has to be precisely that � the individual driver�s personal circumstances must be exceptional. Jake has provided a good pointer to how this may be successful. An example often used for demonstration is where the driver has to care for a disabled dependant who needs mobility which only the convicted driver can provide.

Loss of employment following loss of licence is not considered exceptional. The view of the courts is that drivers who need to drive to retain their jobs should bear this in mind when driving.

I don�t feel inclined to get involved in the speeding and camera argument which flip-flop has raised. I will simply say that the law is as it is, not as some people would like it to be. And you do, after all, get three warnings in most circumstances before you are disqualified under �totting up�.

[jake-the-peg]

I suspect JudgeJ means anomalous rather than false.

To assume what you may have seen must be false simply because the rules say it shouldn't happen would at best be foolish and at worst display a total detatchment from reality.

Take this for example:
http://archive.thisisessex.co.uk/2005/7/1/1150 12.html

This does seem a pretty clear example of a magistrate misinterpreting the rules - I don't know if the prosecution can appeal in cases like this but hopefully at the very least somebody had a word with the magistrate and put her straight.

I mean what is the point of guidelines when JPs still seem to think they know best? anyone would think they were professionals

[JudgeJ]

Thanks, jake. Perhaps anomalous would have been a better word to use. I did actually have in mind falsehoods rather than anomalies when I wrote my reply. I was thinking of the sort of �pub talk� that gets around from time to time � �A mate of mine got up to twelve points and all he got was a good talking to�� � that sort of thing. Perhaps his mate did not accumulate twelve points or got more than a good talking to, so the story was false.

Nonetheless instances that seem to be anomalous do occur from time to time and the example you provide certainly seems bad on the face of it.

As far as the �exceptional hardship� plea goes, although they are provided with fairly detailed guidelines and their legal advisor will refer them to copious case law, it is entirely within their discretion to rule whether any particular case succeeds on these grounds or not.

It is true that magistrates are not professionals inasmuch as they are not paid, but many of them have years of experience in using their discretion sensibly. Because they are not paid does not render them incapable of sound judgement any more than paying a judge makes him any more capable.

It should also be noted that an argument of exceptional hardship can only be successfully used once. The points a driver has after succeeding with his plea remain on his licence. Should he gain further penalty points the �totting up� rule will be invoked again and the same argument cannot be used a second time.

[denisegordon]

JudgeJ you are obviously very knowledgeable and everything in your first answer is what our solicitor told us - that there is no leeway (?) and that a ban will be given if there are no exceptional circumstances. Unfortunately the loss of his job and potentially our house is not extreme enough. I know he should have thought of that and I don't defend him. Jake-the-peg is right in that there are people out there without a ban on more than 12 points, my husband's colleague definitely has 14 and got a larger fine in place of a ban.

I read on a website that when you get your licence back it has no points - is this because the ban is a punishment for the full 12 points rather than the latest 3? I know if he gets 12 again he gets an automatic one year ban, but believe me that had better not happen!

[jake-the-peg]

Unfortuanately the nature of the magistrates position is such that it has a nasty habit of attracting people with a certain self-righteous streak and the fact that it's unpaid and in "office hours" also tends to filter out candidates whose careers and other responsibilities make it impossible for them.

An old lecturer of mine, for whom pretty much everyone had great respect was pretty much arm-twisted into becoming a JP by the local Labour party of which he was a member to try to in some small way off-set the today domination of the local bench by the blue-rinse-brigade.

Hopefully there's a better spread these days but I have my doubts - may be time to professionalise the bench - maybe we'll have the discussion in a seperate thread.

I'll stop hijacking Denises one now!

Best of luck Denise

[JudgeJ]

If your husband is banned under the �totting up� rules then the points he has accumulated (including those for the most recent offence) are wiped off his licence. He will thus have no points when his licence is returned. (Note that the endorsements remain on record and they will still have to be declared for insurance purposes). Only if he is successful with his plea of exceptional hardship (and is thus not disqualified) will the points remain.

Your solicitor will obviously advise you on the best course of action regarding the exceptional hardship plea. My view is that it is worth a try. It costs you nothing (apart from your solicitor�s extra fees for putting your case to the court). Also, it does not involve jeopardising any �discount� you might get in the way that pleading not guilty to an offence (and subsequently being found guilty at trial) does.

The key word in all this is �exceptional�. The justices may well find it exceptional if your husband can show that as well as losing his livelihood, he will also lose his house. This is especially so if you have children who may also become homeless as a result. I�d be interested to learn the outcome.

[denisegordon]

Well he got his ban, on the positive side it is only 6 months rather than 12! Our lawyer wasn't prepared to take more of our money to pay him to fight a case he said we wouldn't win, so he went to court to accept the ban rather than fight it. Since they don't accept losing your job as extreme hardship we did not have any grounds for exception.

I know that sounds like we just gave in, but we had no reason to be treated differently and he shouldn't have been speeding. At least now he's only on a push bike he shouldn't get caught again! We'll see.....

[johnfrater]

my mate had an ice cream van ,which he sold drugs from.He kept everybody happy,young or old.Then he got sent down for 5 yrs .Can't understand kept van immaculate and never went over speed limit

[johnfrater]

lifes a bitch