‘May I be excused?’
STAR WANTS SPEEDING DRIVERS TO BE LET OFF
MOTOR-MAD James May wants speeding drivers let off six times every year before they can be fined.
He revealed his idea on the new website he runs with fellow Grand Tour hosts Jeremy Clarkson and Richard Hammond.
His rant against motoring laws comes after he was caught speeding last September minutes after he bought a new motorbike.
James, 54, pictured inset on one of his bikes, said on Drive Tribe: “As you may know by now, I was recently busted by a speed camera for doing 37 in a 30mph limit.
“To be honest that stretch of 30mph seems absurd, it used to be 40mph, and I know that camera catches a lot of people. I could go on to say that it looks like a cynical money-grabbing exercise.”
He posted a mock police mugshot of himself above his article, holding a piece of cardboard with the word “Guilty” scrawled across it and a fake prisoner number.
James added: “I try my best to stick to urban speed limits. Most of them are fair enough. But I’m only human and I make mistakes. So JOE HINTON does everyone who drives. So, morally, everyone who drives must immediately go down the cop shop and hand themselves in.
“But that isn’t going to happen and we can’t have a society that makes everyone a criminal because it would become meaningless. Here’s a suggestion. We can have speed cameras. We continue to paint them yellow and all the rest of it. But you can speed, say, six times in a year before you get a fine. But you don’t know how many times you’ve been caught until you’ve done it six times and you get the letter.”
He added: “The point of speed cameras, we’re told, is to stop people speeding. This system still does but avoids the moral effrontery of punishing them merely for being human. Tell me why I’m wrong, please.”
James is often mocked by his co-presenters as “Captain Slow” due to his more cautious approach to driving. But after he picked up a 599cc Honda motorbike in London last September, he was clocked doing over the 30mph limit and took a speed awareness course.
He said at the time: “It’s a fair cop. I try to respect speed limits and rules in urban areas. “Out on the motorways and in the country it’s a bit different but I try to abide by the rules in the city.”
His co-hosts have been guilty of speeding. In 2014 Jeremy Clarkson was copped doing “80 something” in a 60mph zone but brushed off the incident saying it was “nothing catastrophic, nobody died”.
The same year, he and Hammond were caught and fined speeding while filming in France.