More than a million people fear driving ban New penalty points system welcomed

31 March 2007 20:57 GMT / By Jonathan Goddard

More than a million British motorists are on the brink of losing their licences, according to a new report.

There are currently 6000 speed cameras monitoring drivers in the UK and currently 4.5 million drivers have points on their licence for speeding. One in five (21%) of these drivers are one conviction away from a driving ban – an increase of 4% in the past 12 months.

According to a leading insurance company, this means in the last year alone more than 215,000 extra drivers have put themselves just one conviction away from a driving ban.

Within the past 3 years drivers have paid out over £300million in speeding tickets. The research found that nearly half of the convictions given to drivers caught speeding were over the limit by less than 10mph.

Under the new graduated penalty points system drivers doing less than 10mph are likely to receive less points than the current three. The research found that three quarters of drivers support the Government’s proposal, which will replace the current system with a points scheme dependent on how much the driver has exceeded the limit.