Give 'safe' speedsters a break, National urges police

Tony Ryall

Police should be more flexible when issuing speeding tickets, says the National party.

It would instruct police not to take a rigid approach towards fining drivers.

National leader Don Brash has repeatedly criticised the number of speeding tickets issued ahead of a law-and-order policy statement on the issue set to be made later in the campaign.

Law-and-order spokesman Tony Ryall confirmed that National planned an annual road safety policing agreement between the Government and the police commissioner.

Police have operated a 10km/h tolerance policy since 2000, meaning any driver caught travelling more than 10km/h over the speed limit will almost inevitably receive a ticket.

"People driving at 111km/h may be no more risky that at 110km/h and we don't think that the quota ticketing - that you must issue a ticket to that person - should carry on," said Mr Ryall.

"This is not a licence to speed. What we are saying is we need to adopt a more realistic attitude to speed."

Acting national road policing manager John Kelly said yesterday that police had no "quota" systems. But some regions had performance agreements specifying how many tickets officers were expected to collect each hour.