A Cynical Attempt to Extort Money?

You’ll all be familiar with these signs. They have been put up in the last few years to improve road safety around schools in the borough.

It didn’t take long for the mayor to see another money-making opportunity at the expense of local motorists.

Until recently, it seems, at the beginning of every school holiday and half-term, a council worker would drive round the borough and adjust the signage to allow traffic to use the roads during holidays. During the holidays there were no children in school so there was no need for additional restrictions. You can see the rings and clip allowing an adjustment.

Then, in October 2022 the signs were not changed during the half-term holiday. Consequently, motorists who have been expecting to drive along roads with no restrictions suddenly found themselves fined. As always, the recording is done by cameras and the motorist does not know that he has committed an offence until a week later.

This is nothing more than a cynical abuse of power to use fixed penalty notices as a form of unrestricted taxation.

Beware, there are moves afoot to grant councils the power to enforce the 20mph speed limits and keep the receipts. Another invitation to milk the motorist.