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Last year I was appointed editor of a magazine called First Car. It’s an established title which sells 150,000 copies of each issue, to local authorities which send it out to young drivers. One of the features in the current issue is on drug driving; the dangers of driving while on drugs, plus the potential penalties for doing so.

One police force’s in-house magazine had a feature on drug driving recently, so I got in touch to ask if we could use any of the images; a fair enough request you’d think, and especially as we were happy to pay for them. The next day I received a phone call from the force’s press office to say in no uncertain terms that we couldn’t have any images, there would be no interviews with anybody and there was no discussion to be had about it. Hmm…

As well as the drugs feature there’s one on a traffic cop and his car (kit carried, resources available, training needed, etc), plus one on the various ways you can incur a fine or get penalties while driving. Cop woman made it clear there would be no help forthcoming for either of these features at all – and again, there was no discussion to be had on the subject.

To try to get off the ground we dealt with other police press offices, including those for the Home Office, ACPO, while we also spoke to the folks representing the NHS and Talk to Frank (for the drug driving piece). Not one was able to offer an interview, images, info or indeed any help in any way.

So, here we are trying to put together a magazine that goes out to 150,000 young drivers, with a focus specifically on road safety. The buyers are road safety officers from local authorities, so we’re clearly on side – and God knows they currently have a mountain to climb as 17-year olds constantly propel themselves into the scenery at high speed. Despite this, I didn’t get a single piece of help of any kind from a single press office I dealt with; nobody I spoke to was interested. Do you find that ever so slightly worrying? I know I do.

I don’t read newspapers any more, and I rarely read magazines other than the odd car title, because it’s getting too depressing. Everywhere you look there are tales of woe – either that or one report after another on plain stupid decisions.

A friend sent me a cutting from New Civil Engineer recently, and in it there was a piece on how Buckinghamshire County Council has cut the costs of sorting out congestion between Aylesbury and Milton Keynes, from £128m to just £11m.

Sounds like a great idea, does it not? Sadly, not so; delve slightly deeper and you’ll quickly discover that this £11m is basically the cost of doing nothing. Instead of building much-needed fresh infrastructure, there will be lots of money spent on better cycle paths and more public transport.

The decision comes after discussions between the local authority and Friends of the Earth, which says building new roads provides poor value for money; it seems the council somehow didn’t get round to consulting those who actually travel between the two towns.

Still, all those thousands of people travelling the 21 miles between the two towns will no doubt be heartened by the fact that the £11m is apparently far better value than £128m being spent on something people might actually want to use.

I’ve long been concerned about how easily the government is swayed into adopting barmy rules and regulations for our roads; laws that criminalise perfectly safe driving. One of the reasons for this is that there are lots of tiny pressure groups all trying to outdo each other with ludicrous proposals – which in most cases have knocked the road safety clock back by several decades.

One such group is Brake; I’ve mentioned them before and if you don’t know just how out of touch with reality the group is, how’s this for a gem. In response to a woman being banned for driving on a motorway at 10mph, the group had this to say:

“This case sends out a very strange message to drivers. Mrs Cole was not breaking the speed limit or endangering anyone with her actions, yet she received a seven-day ban, when we commonly see drivers caught travelling at 80 or 90mph get away with a fine and three points. While it is not common to encounter someone travelling at 10mph on a motorway, a competent driver should always be looking well ahead and predicting when they need to overtake a slower vehicle”.

Hmmm, not endangering anyone else eh? Do these people never get behind the wheel themselves? It seems not, as a friend of mine was listening to the radio recently, and appearing on one of the programmes was a Brake spokesperson. She was asked whether she ever broke the speed limit, to which her reply was that she hardly ever drove, but that she had broken the limit. When pushed, she also revealed that few of Brake’s campaigners ever drive. If this is the case, how can they offer opinions on the mechanics of driving?

Very sad news on the wires within the last few days; perhaps the most avid campaigner ever, for sensible motoring laws, has died. Paul Smith was just 52, yet the amount of knowledge he gained from the last seven years of his life, spent fighting for his cause, was quite remarkable.

Paul set up the SafeSpeed website around seven years ago; it quickly became the reference for anyone wanting chapter and verse on road safety. Working closely with the Association of British Drivers, another group intent on uncovering motoring injustices, Paul highlighted major flaws in our government’s road safety policy – yet he got little thanks for it. While the ABD is run by a group of volunteers, Paul devoted his life to his crusade, running SafeSpeed as a one-man band.

I always felt guilty for not speaking to Paul more often than  I did; he uncovered one news story after another; sometimes it was research brushed under the carpet and other times it was some astonishing revelation he’d come up with by doing a bit of number crunching. While the SafeSpeed press releases and website suggested he had a chip on his shoulder, justifiable because of the government’s lazy attitude towards road safety, Paul always spoke calmly and rationally. Also, contrary to popular belief, his licence was always clean.

Thanks to his dogged determination, many dismissed Paul as a crank. The tragedy is, it’s unlikely that anyone will ever take over where Paul left off, ensuring the failed road safety policies of this government will remain. Perhaps the most fitting tribute possible would be a rethink of the UK’s road safety policy, so we can get it back on track. Instead, Paul’s demise will lead to huge sighs of relief in many quarters – which is surely the greatest injustice of all.

So, Greedy Gordon has decided to fleece us further by implementing the fuel tax increase he promised us back in April. Odd that, a politician keeping his promise. With crude oil now at $83 per barrel, and interest rates creeping up, even greater pressure on our personal budgets is just what we’re all crying out for right now.

What’s the betting that when the PM calls an election next year, he’ll try to sweeten us all up with a small cut in the duty on fuel? He’ll have already enjoyed an extra 2p per litre flowing into his coffers for six months – except it’s not 2p per litre – it’s actually 2.3p per litre. Not only do we all fork out fuel duty (which is a tax), but we also pay VAT on that duty (which is a tax). So we’re paying a tax on a tax! If you pay 95p for a litre of unleaded, nearly 64p of that goes straight to the Treasury!

Unsurprisingly, the antis are saying the latest increase isn’t enough, and that we should be forking out at least a fiver for every litre we put in our tanks. Predictably, Transport 2000 (largely funded by public transport operators and now known as the Campaign for Better Transport) is saying the increase is welcome – as long as the extra money raised is spent directly on public transport. Hmm, let me see – I bet that’s exactly why Gordon Brown has instigated the rise – to spend all the extra cash on buses.

Of course we’re told that such increases are essential if we’re to stop the world overheating, but the Government knows only too well that it’s convenience, not price, which dictates the mode of transport we choose. That raises the issue of whether or not mankind has really had any effect on the Earth’s climate, but that’s one for another day methinks…

Cars and their drivers have always been an easy target, and right now they’re under pressure like never before. Blamed for all of society’s ills, from climate change to poor air quality and the cause of death and destruction galore, the car is a convenient scapegoat. And that’s the key word here; convenient. Nothing matches the convenience of the car when it comes to getting on with your life.

I’m a keen cyclist, but when I’ve got to lug my camera gear even a short distance, it’s not the Claude Butler that’s going to make the journey. If I’m just nipping into town, I’ll always walk – if I’ve got the time. The problem is, I often haven’t. As a result, I select the best of mode of transport for the task in hand and that’s often the car, even if I’d rather walk or cycle.

So far so good, but there’s a bunch of people who reckon they can determine which journeys are essential and which are not – and they’re taking over transport planning. There’s a growing number of folks who reckon that public transport is good and private transport is bad, whatever the circumstances. Then there are the professional campaigners, who spend their lives protesting against any development whatsoever; they’re the ones who insist that much-needed bypasses only encourage more travel, so all roadbuilding must be halted.

If you’ve got a strong stomach and a decent sense of self-restraint, perhaps you’d like to encounter some of these people first-hand. I’ve done it and I can honestly say that you have to experience these people to believe them; they’d generally prefer us to go back to the days of the horse and cart and are often the biggest hypocrites you’ll ever meet. If you don’t believe me, get along to this year’s Roadblock extravaganza, in Birmingham on 27 October. Intriguingly, it’s run by the Campaign for Better Transport – which of course really means the Campaign for No Transport.

Deputy Labour leader Harriet Harman is facing fresh embarrassment after being caught speeding – for the second time in four years. However, of less concern to me is that she got nicked; what riles is the treatment she’s received.

Any other driver is allowed only 28 days to pay a £60 fixed penalty fine, yet Harman was allowed to pay hers more than five months after the offence, to avoid her case being heard in open court. On this occasion, she was issued with a fixed penalty notice after being caught on camera doing 50mph in a temporary 40mph zone through roadworks on the A14 near Ipswich in early April. She “forgot” to pay the fine within the allotted time and was due to have her case heard recently by Ipswich magistrates.

However, the CPS withdrew the summons and the court was later told that the matter had been settled. The official policy of the Suffolk Safety Camera Partnership is that the option of paying a fixed penalty is conditional and only open to motorists for 28 days after a notice is issued. If not, the partnership says that a court summons is “automatic”.

Despite this, a spokesman is quoted as claiming that “this matter was dealt with by standard procedure. If we can, we will deal with matters by way of a fixed penalty even at the stage after a summons has been sent. It is standard procedure and the same for any member of the public. It is done to save the court time.”

Harman could have been fined up to £1,000 and received six points had the case been heard by magistrates. As it was, she got away with three points and the fixed, £60 fine. Bear that in mind if you receive a summons in the near future; a precedent has now been set.

Next year will mark the start of my third decade as a driver, and until this week I’ve managed to avoid getting into any of those nasty road rage situations that you hear so much about. But I’m no longer a road rage virgin; my slate is now forever sullied, and through no fault of my own.

I was heading up the M5 recently, when I heard on the radio that there was trouble up ahead. A crunch had caused tailbacks, so I was even more vigilant than usual, scanning the horizon on the lookout for stationary traffic.

Sitting in lane three at a steady 55mph or so (all the lanes were doing the same), I noticed that way up ahead, the traffic was slowing. Behind me was a Golf driver, who seemed to want a tow, so I just eased off a little more, knowing that he’d shortly be parking in my boot if I didn’t create some extra braking space for both of us. Easing off only agitated Golf man to the point where he started gesticulating wildly. I adjusted my rear-view mirror, so he knew that I realised he was there. Big mistake; he must have bust a blood vessel he was so angry.

As the traffic came to a halt he started waving his fists, flashing his lights and tooting his horn. Then, as lane two started to move, he moved across in a hurry, undertook me, then cut in front of me just as my queue started to move off. But the traffic then stopped again, so Golf man took the opportunity to jump out of his car and start hurling abuse at me.

Intrigued, I got out of my car and asked him what the problem was. Apoplectic with rage, purple-faced Golf man told me in no uncertain terms that I’m just the sort of person who causes accidents, that I shouldn’t be on the road, and all sorts of other very personal stuff that I won’t bore you with. And you know the tragedy of it all? This bloke really did believe that the whole episode was all my fault, and that he was the innocent party. How does that work then?

I know my last blog was about cloned registration plates, but it seems things are even worse than I thought. Even people who have never received a fine through the post – deserved or otherwise – are now petrified about being stitched up. it’s now reached the point where it’s spreading to those who don’t even know anyone affected by cloned number plates.

Perhaps it’s the power of the press, but I’m increasingly encountering people who don’t want their classic cars to be identifiable when I photograph them. Bearing in mind that I take pictures of classic cars for several different publications, none of whom ever blank out registrations, that’s a problem!

There was a time when classic car owners would get positively moist at the prospect of seeing their car featured in a magazine – even if it was just a few lines and a small shot in the corner of the page. Now they’re terrified of their car being identifiable, lest their registration should start appearing on similar cars nationwide.

The tragedy is, even owners of ultra-rare or even unique classics are falling into the trap, assuming that only the registration matters – the car itself doesn’t seem to enter the equation. I was talking to someone recently who has a unique car; it’s the sole survivor of just a dozen or so originally built. He’s worried that if I photograph his car and leave the number plate visible, he’ll be the victim of a cloning episode. Are there no bounds to human paranoia?

I was going to post something about the Association of Chief Police Officers’ recent declaration that there’s an urgent need to revamp the vehicle registration process. But then I got talking to Paul Smith at Safe Speed (you’ll notice I do that rather a lot) and he summed it up so succinctly that it seemed pointless reinventing the wheel. So in a special guest blog, here’s what Paul has to say, echoing my thoughts exactly.

“What’s really going on here? Number plate thefts are up. Uninsured driving is up. Hit and run is up. Vehicle cloning is up. False vehicle registration details are probably well up. Many vehicles are untraceable, and motorists are being convicted of the serious criminal offence of perverting the course of justice. As the authorities increasing rely on number plates for the automated enforcement of motoring offences, for taxes and for criminal identification, people will increasingly respond by putting themselves outside of the system.

“Enforcement with cameras and computers is causing these undesirable responses and consequential new crimes. While this was easily predictable – even obvious – the authorities apparently took no account of the possibility. The actions that are causing these problems include speed cameras, bus lane cameras, overzealous parking enforcement, Automatic Number Plate Recognition (ANPR) and congestion charging.

“In the last five or six years these enforcement methods and technologies have multiplied at an unprecedented rate. None of it has been useful, necessary or effective. Far from building a better society, it’s clear that these devices and methods have created a far worse society. They are developed and promoted by those with a vested interest, and the only people who do well from them are the technology suppliers themselves. Crimes, like car cloning, were the exclusive preserve of organised criminals just five years ago, but already are an epidemic and a major concern. Technology makes an excellent servant, but a cruel and incompetent master.”