Foreign drivers will no longer be able to escape detection for speeding and jumping red lights under a cross-border enforcement plan announced by the European Commission yesterday.

Police will be able to demand the names and addresses of owners of vehicles registered in any EU state.

The new power will make it much easier to trace foreign drivers who commit offences in Britain. It will also mean that British motorists driving overseas are more likely to be sent penalties in the post when they are caught by speed and red light cameras.

At present police rarely pursue drivers of foreign-registered vehicles who trigger cameras because of the difficulty in obtaining their details. Foreign drivers account for about 5 per cent of road traffic in the EU but are responsible for an average of 15 per cent of speeding offences — 30 per cent in some states.

Jacques Barrot, the EU Transport Commissioner, said that the exchange of drivers’ data was needed because too many people felt they could drive “with impunity” abroad. He said the ease with which they evaded prosecution discriminated against resident motorists, who were penalised routinely.

Under the Commission proposal, which needs the agreement of EU governments, the new cross-border strategy would apply to speeding, jumping red lights, drink-driving and failing to wear a seatbelt, which “imperil road safety” and are involved in almost 75 per cent of all road deaths.

The Commission said the directive would cover only enforcement of fines and would not include penalty points or disqualification. The Parliamentary Advisory Council for Transport Safety said it should be tightened to ensure drivers had their licences endorsed for offences committed overseas.

Nick Lester, transport director for London Councils, welcomed the plan but said obtaining the vehicle owner’s details was only the first hurdle. Police would still face difficulties in ensuring that drivers paid their penalties. He said that some countries, including Finland, Denmark and Sweden, already helped police in other states to trace drivers. He added that France was the most unco-operative country.

There are 140,000 foreign-registered vehicles on Britain’s roads at any one time and three million enter each year. The largest group are Polish vehicles, which account for 36 per cent, followed by French vehicles at 10 per cent and German vehicles at 9 per cent. Foreign vehicles are 30 per cent more likely to be involved in a crash than a UK-registered vehicle, according to research by London Councils.

Mr Lester called for the offences covered by the proposal to be extended to include all traffic offences, including evasion of the congestion charge, parking offences and infringing yellow boxes and turning restrictions.A government spokesman said: “We will consider the Commission’s proposal in the coming weeks. Certainly, there is a need to ensure that people visiting the UK who put others’ lives at risk on our roads should not escape punishment.”

The Commission said the plan would require national authorities to agree a standard EU-wide “offence notification” to be sent to the identified driver. Once approved by EU capitals, the member states would have two years to set up the data exchange system and start operating it.

The Commission admitted yesterday that its target of halving road deaths by 2010 would probably not be achieved.

In the benchmark year of 2001, 54,000 people were killed on the roads of the 27 EU member states. The number has fallen, but last year, for the first time since 2001, the figure levelled out, remaining at 43,000.

Vehicles at large

— In the past five years there has been a 47 per cent rise in the number of foreign drivers involved in accidents in Britain

— Foreign lorries are three times more likely to be involved in collisions than British lorries

— Cheshire Council was criticised for erecting signs in both English and Polish after so many lorries had taken wrong turns

— In 2006 a bus company was ordered to suspend its fleet because of concerns about its Polish drivers’ command of English

Source: Times database

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