Freedom of Information Act 2005

[gatso_god]

It has been reliably suggested to me that under the 'Freedom of Information Act' which came into force on 1st Jan this year, the police/safety camera partnership will have to divulge the locations of all 'safety camera' sites. The arguement goes that as 'safety cameras' are located at accident blackspots, the public have a right to know where the these blackspots are. Hopefully the exact coordinates will be forthcoming and not withstanding the sterling efforts made by Pocket GPS, an accurate and complete database will shortly be available to all. Does anyone else share this view and know if it's likely to come about in the near term without pressure being brought to bear ?

[DavidW]

I'm not a lawyer, and I haven't thought through the full consequences of this; it may be that the Safety Camera Partnerships manage to use one of the exemptions in the Act not to divulge the data.

Be aware that it's the Freedom of Information Act 2000, as it was given Royal Assent in 2000. The provisions of the Act didn't come in until 1 January 2005, but that doesn't make it a 2005 Act.



David

[kartracer]

Those police forces which are members of the Safety Camera Partnership do already publish the location of their cameras, including where the mobile ones are most likely to be on any given date:
http://www.nationalsafetycameras.co.uk/nscl/cameras/cameras.html
However, although most UK police forces are members of the partnership scheme, not all are. They only have to be members if they want to retain a share of the profits from the use of cameras for "reinvesting in safety". Also, the web site does not list co-ordinates but just flags them on a map.
_________________
Kam

[gatso_god]

Apologies for missing out the comma in my title DavidW, I meant to indicate the acts relevance to this year.

I take your point about the police trying to use an exemption to the act so as not to have to divulge the camera and trap location but my understadnig is that such exemptions will only be granted on the basis of independent review and in the case of national security or public safety.

It stands to reason that the camera's raison d'etre is to promote safety, or at least thats what we are continually told. So grounds for withholding the co-ordinate information are shaky to say the least. Indeed, given some driver's reaction to passing a camera, it could be said that advance warning of their location would serve to alert drivers to accident blackspots and to stop the panic braking thus improving road safety at a stroke.

To take this logic to its natural conclusion, how much better it would be to have all 'safety locations' marked with a danger triangle warning sign that had synchronised flashing strobe lights in its three corners, as they do in France and elsewhere in Europe to highlight danger to motorists. You even see them on the tops of parked up telecom vans etc. over there.

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