How speed camera backers make cash from speed cameras

Organisations campaigning to save speed cameras receive income generated by the devices, MCN can reveal.

The Parliamentary Advisory Council for Transport Safety, Road Safety GB and the AA issued a joint statement calling for cameras not to be sacrificed in Coalition spending cuts.

Now MCN can disclose how each of those organisations receives income generated through camera use.  

PACTS’ members, who fund the group through subscriptions, include two speed camera manufacturers, Redspeed International and Speed Check Services (SPECS).

As members, the companies have a say in determining PACTS’ policies, which go into the advice it gives parliament.

Road Safety GB is a trade association representing local authority road safety officers whose jobs may be threatened by the government funding cuts affecting cameras.

The group’s annual conference is sponsored by Road Safety Support (RSS), a firm which makes millions out of speed cameras by providing expert witnesses to assist in prosecutions.

The AA provides ‘speed awareness courses’ through its ‘AA Drivetech’ arm. The courses are offered as an alternative to prosecution. Around 30,000 offenders a year pay between £60 and £100 to take the course instead of receive points.

AA president Edmund King denied the firm had a financial incentive for supporting speed cameras, adding: “We’ve supported speed awareness courses long before we were anything to do with Drivetech.”

PACTS executive director Robert Gifford said the organisation received £6,800 in subscriptions from speed camera manufacturers last year, 3.3% of its income.

He said: “Policy is determined by discussions within working parties, the membership of which reflects the breadth of PACTS’ membership, not just the commercial sector.”

Road Safety GB said: “We support speed cameras to encourage drivers to reduce their speed and travel within the speed limit.

“Road Safety GB does not receive any direct financial contribution from safety camera manufacturers.”