‘Fatal 5’ campaign rolls out

LOCKERBIE is at the heart of a new roads policing campaign to catch misbehaving drivers. The area’s roads police team is based there and have now stepped up patrols locally as part of a two-week national crackdown.

And this week they sent a warning to motorists that anyone found careless driving, speeding, drink and drug driving, using a mobile phone and not wearing a seatbelt will be targeted.

These are the five offences which lead to the most serious road traffic collisions (RTCs).

The ‘Fatal 5’ campaign aims to catch more drivers who are committing one of the five offences and, just as crucially, educate them on the dangers they pose.

Inspector Bob McNay heads a team of 34 police constables and five sergeants across the region’s road policing unit.

Explaining the campaign, which started on Monday and runs through to October 5, he said: “During this time all officers, not just road traffic, will be on the lookout for those that are failing to comply with legislation in relation to the five offences that are deemed to be the most likely to contribute to RTCs where people are killed and seriously injured.

“These are offences officers will continue to target throughout the year. But during this two week period we are increasing the number of marked and unmarked patrols to try and increase the number of detections and also educate drivers.”

The inspector added: “One in five young drivers will be involved in a road traffic collision within the first year of them passing their test.

“The severity of those collisions can range from a non-injury bump right up to, sadly, fatalities. The causes for that are inexperience and potentially a risky attitude towards driving.

“We are not only out on the roads enforcing, we are also running some input at

local schools to highlight the effects and impacts irresponsible driving can have.

“That moment of inattention when driving could be the difference between killing someone and not.

“The majority of people on the road don’t go out there with the intention of causing others harm, and they’re by and large not bad people.

“Using a mobile phone, speeding, failing to wear a seatbelt, drink and drug driving or careless driving, there’s no excuse for any of that.

“It only takes a brief moment for your attention to be taken away from the complex job of driving.

“I would always encourage drivers to make sure they concentrate fully on their driving and hold off any distractions and make sure they are up to date with changes in the Highway Code.

“It’s recently been updated to change the hierarchy of road users, so there’s more care given to the road users that are most vulnerable such as pedestrians, cyclists and people on horses.

“A lot of our stops from drink and drug drivers come from members of the public who have reported it.

“I would thank those that have done that and urge people to continue to do so.”