If you get caught with cannabis and are under 16 you will always get arrested, if you are over 16 and eligible, you can get a caution, a caution is a recordable police record, you don't get a police record for having the wrong reg plate.

The chances of your car being found when nicked due to ANPR!!! I'd love to see the stats on that...somehow I doubt they are that impressive. And as I said if this system is so restrictive in what it can read it should never have been installed in the first place. Your own arguement would suggest every crook in the country can evade detection simply by fiddling with the font or spacing on numberplates. What utter nonsense. Or better still. Get me the number of a silver 650i bmw. Make me up a totally legal copy of that plate because i'm off to nick another silver 650i bmw and I dont want the police paying any attention to me. Again how ridiculous do you want to get with this line of thinking. And well we can fool speed cams by tinkering with the size of our numberplates... And postman pat delivers my mail

This is getting harder as well - you should now have to produce your V5 to get a number plate made up and, as of next month, it will be illegal to sell "show plates" in this country, so to get a dodgy plate you will either have to (a) know somebody who makes them and who will stamp one out for you or (b) physically remove the plate from a car which, if it's reported, should set up a trigger on ANPR to pull over anybody displaying that plate.

Andrew no one in the business of stealing top marque motors has any problem whatsoever getting plates made up. Just like ppl have no problem getting fake id's or blank credit cards or whatever else they need for their line of business. Govt making laws for the lawless!!!! well the lawless dont care do they

Since my job involves finding stolen motors, and i find a awful lot of them, i feel i am in a position to let you know what the car thieves do.
There is no problem in getting false plates made up, and when a thief does this they are made to the correct requirment.So if thief A steals a Silver 650 BMW he then has plates made up that match to another 650 BMW, problem is when the 650 is stolen every cop in that city will be looking for a silver 650, so still a good chance he's going to be found.
Then there is the not so good car thief who nicks any car new or old and drives around with original plates on, this is when ANPR picks them up, and believe me we have more than you would believe.
Wether you like it or not most crimes involve a vehicle at some point, so the police are getting stricter pulling you for small offencers.
Last week we did a roadside block pulling people for no seatbelt, we ended up arresting several people that were wanted for other offences, like it or not if your not legal you will end up been pulled sonner or later.

This thread is depressingly familiar and I can't help thinking that it is indicative of the progressive breakdown of communication and trust between the police and the community they serve. The police service are called upon to enforce laws which they do not make (and rightfully so in a mature democracy). If the laws are ill-conceived or are not explainjed sufficiently clearly along with the reasoning behind them, then the community or parts of it will feel alienated and resentful towards those trying to enforce them. The situation is exacerbated when the police are either overly forceful in their approach or the public overly surly. The key to this must surely be better communication between lawmakers and police and between police and community. It is a two-way street. There are, of course, other problems, such as (for example) the removal of discretion in issuing speeding fines due to the introduction of cameras. This has bred enormous resentment among the driving public as they simply see faceless "authority" raiding their wallets and endorsing their licenses with absolutely no right of appeal to common sense. I imagine (and this is a guess) that the police often feel frustrated and angry that their ability to demonstrate discretion and thus win "hearts and minds" has been removed by the same camera-oriented policies.

I think the executive has been guilty of undermining (not to mention underfunding) and I would also say diverting the police service for many years. Yes, we want protection from burglars, musrderers and terrorists, but we want it from people we can identify with and support as "us", not the seemingly inflexible, out-of-touch police service we see and who are understandably defensive when all they are doing is their job within the constraints imposed on them by the politicians.

Sorry, I know I'm ranting, but basically it could all be so much beter if the public and police communicated more and understood the other's position.

Its a nanny state, a paranoid over bearing fly on the wall, invasive state, an errosion of civil liberties and a huge big slippery slope.......


And the chances are if your car is nicked you'll still never see it again.

Totally agree

That sounds like a neat paraphrase of, "The ends justify the means".

One presumes that if you had police officers randomly stopping people in the street, or searching randomly selected houses, then you'd catch some people who were either wanted or were engaged in some sort of criminal activity - does that make it right?

There are many powers that we can hand to the police which will make the apprehension of criminals much, much easier for them, but at some point we cross the line where the public have more reason to fear the police than they do the criminals.

Lickyl.

You make some real good points here. And i'm almost sorry to say i completely agree with you.

its a shame that the innocent have to be punished for the sake of catching the not so innocent though.

like you say road sides picking up not so squeaky clean cars (legally wise) is often a very good way at picking up people that don't want to be found by the police

what are my thoughts on this?

One argument is that if you have nothing to hide, what does it matter that your on cctv though most of your working day,
your tracked on your car journeys via ANPR though a nationally networked computer system,
your number plate is logged at every petrol station you visit.
Your store reward cards that you think are such a great addition to your wallet track you spending habbets, what you eat, how much petrol you use
What does it matter that google, your ISP's log and recored all your Internet surfing habbets and downloads

People jump up and down about there worrys of a big brother state, were already there, and have been for some time

we are the most recorded/tracked country in the world

is this right? at what price do we/have we given away are freedom and privacy to feel safe? who watches the watchers?

now if you don't mind, im off to put my tin foil hat back on and continue installing my farad cage in my office

This is what anoys me most stolen cars are recovered, and it's people like me who spend thier days finding these cars so people like you can get them back.

Look what you caused now Baz...hope your happy

People like me!!!

As opposed to people like what exactly?

MOST stolen cars are recovered...I find that very very hard to believe. I do know that the police have had a significant impact on cutting car crime but I've never come across stats that show the majority of stolen cars are recovered. And I dont think counting burnt out cars can be considered as a found and returned!!!

People like you as in the public, who i serve, you would be suprised how many cars don't turn up burn out anymore.
Most cars that are stolen are by means of burglary, and the cars is used by the thief for as long as possible to commit more crimes.
And this is my point you don't work for the police so it is only your opinion how many cars are recovered and how we find them,however i am one of the people who finds the cars hence i know how and why to be fact.

I dont need to work for the police to deduce your claims as nothing but inaccurate propaganda


http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/nottinghamshire/4217091.stm

10% in nottinghamshire found and you can translate that into MOST!!!!

I tried to google official up to date figures but they seem more elusive than 90% of stolen cars

That was in 2004, and you can never believe goverment figures.

Or the government and its affiliated agencies...

So your unsupported, anecdotal evidence is more reliable than independent (not Government) figures?

Baz,

Sorry to hear about this Nothing that can be done though and as you say you were in the wrong, shame about the attitude.

Same old story though Police can get away with pretty much almost murder if they want (possibly even murder now if it goes high enough). You just have to hope you get one of the surviving few good ones.

As for the plates, they are essential for the government to be able to follow you around and keep a plotted complete history of your life. Also judging by your plate it is highly likely it would of been readable, I can put it through my ANPR to settle the point if anyone wishes to contest? But again as said plates, either legal or not. Mine are illegal as they have nothing on them except the registration number, though it is the correct size and font (I hate the garage tat on them)

Unfortunately as has been said by belfastjohn we are pretty much hamsters in the country now. Bar the number being placed on our wrist...



BAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

*falls of chair*



If you were serious I will laugh more.

Thanks Andrew I was not aware of this, can you point me towards the official documentation please?

Nick

Naturally enough I now can't find it. If you search on the DVLA site there are consultation documents, which basically say, "If we do this it will put 30,000 manufacturers of show plates out of business, but fccuk 'em", but I can't find any mention of the legistilation.

I would imagine that, as with black visors for motorcycles helmets, suppliers will simply move off-shore.

Wow, ANPR must be sh/t if it cant read a clear display of letters in any font at any reasonable size.

a 13 year old kid in his bedroom can write a recognition system that needs all kinds of shapes and lines and squiggles and angles in it to prevent recognition, which is why you often have to do that when doing stuff on the internet

You should be able to have any font or size you like as long as it passes an ANPR test before it's fitted to the car and is clearly readable (like baz' was)

Whoo-hoo, found it

The relevant section is:

Thanks Andrew

So that will be going through and become law soon then

Well, it's only a guess, but I'd say it becomes law on 1st November 2008.

Of course it doesn't cover people who supply things that only *look* like numberplates, but are actually ornamental book-marks, novelty chopping boards, humerous signs for mounting on the office wall, etc.

This could be his most popular post

Well worth the £30 fine

yaeh deffo it's even got a spelling mistake from AnrewR in it

Phew, just glad it wasn't one of mine.

Would this....perhaps...apply to mildly modified cars with cat pipes removed?

Asking for a friend, ofcourse