British vacationers will dodge EU fines if Brexit ends the detailed exchange deal with the UK
- The UK’s exit from the EU means UK owned cars will not receive any fines
- Hundreds of thousands of Britons have been fined for speeding in recent years
- The change could mean a loss of more than £ 50 million for the French government
British drivers will escape most of the European speeding fines as an agreement on the exchange of information on motorists has ended.
According to a cross-border EU directive, the DVLA had to provide the contact details of those who were accelerated in front of the camera in the member states.
However, the UK’s exit from the bloc means that owners of UK registered vehicles will no longer receive fines from EU countries.
British drivers will escape most of the fines in Europe, which means vehicles will no longer receive fines from EU countries
It also means the DVLA will not be able to solicit the details of European drivers caught in the UK accelerating or committing other road traffic violations, The Times reported.
Hundreds of thousands of Britons have been fined in recent years, with 440,000 fined last year for crimes filmed by street cameras in France.
The French police requested 555,847 driver data from the DVLA from January 2019 to September 2020, an average of 1,000 per day. The AA warned British vacationers that they were being exploited as “cash cows” by French officials who feared they might lose if Britain leaves the EU.
The fines in France, the most popular destination for British drivers, range from £ 61 to £ 3,360. These can be collected up to a year after the offense.
The change could result in more than £ 50 million in loss to the French government if post-pandemic visitor numbers hit previous levels, according to French automotive website Caradisiac.
UK drivers in the EU continue to be fined on the spot for being stopped by the police and driving too fast.
France and the UK only started exchanging information on speeding up crimes caught on camera last year, despite the EU directive dating from 2015.
The UK had originally opted out of the system, stating that the cost of IT systems and processing of penalties would be higher than the income of foreign drivers committing crimes in the UK.
The French government wants to negotiate an agreement with Great Britain to allow fines from one country to another. No such agreement has yet been reached.
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