There have always been myths about loopholes in the law and its quite rare that any of them are true. Recently, a few have popped up regarding driving laws, and as usual, there are very few that have any truth to them.

One of the most common theories people have is that if a police officer makes a mistake on a traffic offence ticket then that ticket is invalid and the charge is void, but as with most theories of this nature, there is very little truth to it.

This is because the ticket that he gives to you is not official evidence, it is just a brief overview of the offence and if you question the validity of the ticket due to an error, then all that will happen is that a court summons will be sent to you and the officer will have to draw up an official statement which he is not likely to make any errors on.

If you challenge the actual accusation however, i.e. you dont believe you did commit the offence they are accusing you of, then a mistake on a ticket could be put forward as evidence that the officers work is inaccurate and unreliable.

However if you did actually commit the offence and a police officer catches you, you dont really have a leg to stand on.

Another myth that people have thought will get them off the hook, is that it is a violation of human rights to ask who was driving at the time of the offence. It is often believed that if you are the registered keeper of the vehicle and theyre asking you who was driving it, that you do not have to tell them because it is within your human rights to withhold this information.

This is simply not true, there has been an amendment to international human rights in this regard meaning that this information has to be provided at the request of the police or you will be liable for a hefty fine and six points on your licence as they claim that the compromise in human rights is proportionate to the need for road safety.

Something else that is fairly common is that when people have insurance policies whereby they can drive other peoples cars with their permission, they will buy a new car and before they are changed to the registered keeper of the vehicle, they drive it around believing that they are insured to do so having kept their insurance on their old car, because officially the new one belongs to someone else.

This is not true either, if money has exchanged hands for the car then as far as a court of law is concerned the car belongs to you, and if you have not transferred the insurance over from your old vehicle, then you are not insured on the new one, and therefore driving illegally.

Tags: Auto

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