What’s a safe speed? A mere 124mph if you are a Derbyshire cop. PC Newsome, the blur in blue, has been given a warning after the Police Complaints Commission investigated a complaint that he drove at 124mph in a 70mph zone without adequate cause. Paul Smith, founder of the Safe Speed road safety campaign (www.safespeed.org.uk) said: "The public will rightly feel aggrieved that they are not afforded similar degrees of tolerance and discretion when they stray just a few mph over an unnecessary speed limit. "Cases like this cause the Police /public relationship to take a beating, not because we're concerned about the police officer’s driving standards, but for two other reasons: - Many of us have been convinced that safety can be measured in miles per hour, but this is entirely without foundation. 5mph in the wrong circumstances is a deadly speed. - Many of us have been convicted of far smaller offences, and have every reason to expect that the standards applied to police officers should at least be comparable." Readers who have been hit in the wallet for the terrible crime of doing 37 in a 30 mph speed zone may like to know more about Safe Speed. The road safety campaign is primarily the work of engineer-turned road safety analyst Paul Smith. Since setting up Safe Speed in 2001, Paul , 51, an advanced motorist and a professional engineer of 25 years UK experience, has carried out over 10,000 hours working on the campaign with well over 5,000 of those hours researching the overall effects of speed camera policy on UK road safety. In addition to those 10,000 hours, Paul has funded to campaign to the tune of £10,000. Safe Speed believes that this is more work in more detail than anything carried out by any other organisation. Paul's surprising conclusion is that overall speed cameras make our roads more dangerous. Paul has identified and reported a number of major flaws and false assumptions in the claims made for speed cameras, and the whole "speed kills" system of road safety. The inescapable conclusion is that we should urgently return to the excellent road safety policies that gave us in the UK the safest roads in the world in the first place. Far from saving lives, speed cameras are a dangerous distraction. Safe Speed does not campaign against speed limits or appropriate enforcement of motoring laws, but argues vigorously that automated speed enforcement is neither safe nor appropriate. Safe Speed is very slimly funded by voluntary contributions to the web site. ‘We are urgently seeking improved funding,’ Paul told thefreepressonline.co.uk ‘The Safe Speed web site contains more than 350,000 words of road safety analysis and information. We are seeking publishers for 'the book of the web site'. ‘It has turned out to be quite an amazing story and there are opportunities for journalists and broadcasters to explore how all this came about, what it means, and where road safety has gone so badly wrong. Contact Safe Speed at: web: http://www.safespeed.org.uk email: psmith@safespeed.org.uk