Vic speed cameras remain off after nine in 68,000 drivers wrongly fined
A number of point-to-point speed cameras in Victoria remain switched of after nine people out of 68,000 were wrongly fined late last year. The particular cameras on the Hume Highway were switched off in October, 2010.
The speed cameras work by calculating the average speed of motorists over a given distance. Police Minister Peter Ryan announced the cameras would remain switched off until further investigations were completed.
Last year, the Department of Justice and speed camera operator Heartfelt, found that nine motorists were falsely fined for speeding due to an error with the cameras. Yesterday, an investigation report by Deloitte accounting firm was released, confirming that the cameras made an error in those nine instances.
Mr Ryan remains confident about the accuracy of camera operations but has withheld having the cameras switched back on until an auditor-general investigation has been put to parliament. He said in a recent ninemsn report,
"The release of this independent report is another step in helping to restore the community's confidence in the state's road safety camera systems."
He emphasised the point recently on Fairfax Radio that,
"I told Victorians we would not turn these things on until we get that auditor-general's report and that's the end of the matter."
Meanwhile, Premier Ted Baillieu also said the Deloitte report showed that there were very few problems with the cameras, and that further investigations would be made. He said,
"We're going to wait for the auditor-general's report so that his comprehensive review of the system can be made public when he's finished. This is about restoring confidence."
The problem was apparently due to an error with timing and syncing of certain point-to-point cameras. One 20-year-old woman was wrongly fined last year for speeding, and the police came around to her house to confiscate her car under Victorian hoon laws. She was then found to be innocent.
If there is more than just a few errors in the accuracy of speed cameras, surely this is a big problem? What do you think, is nine in 68,000 not bad odds? Or should there be zero tolerance?
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