Having stared at the Private plates ready to go on the car now for nearly 18 months I decided this week that they should go on. L15 TY# obviously bacame L15TY #. Rather impressive I thought for a guy called Dave Lister with the permanent nickname of Listy.......

So clutching my paperwork I arrived at DVLA office in Maidstone this morning ready to do the deed. Having queued for an hour I finally left the office at 10.15 and wandered back to the car Park, at this point I then proceeded to swap my old plates for my spangley new ones.

Having completed the job I gets back in the car and started to program Bracknell into the Sat Nav when all hell broke loose. One cop car pulls up beside me while a cop transit blocked off the car park exit...... I was then removed from the car having twigged what had had happened. Some good citizen had spotted me changing the plates and kindly phoned officer dibble.... Now Officer #1 (Lady Officer) see's the funny side and is happy with all my paper work, Officer#2 however must have been on his break and having wandered round the car then decides that he is going to give me a £30 fine anyway for illegal spacing on my plate........ He then just to rub it in decides he wants to take one of my plates with him as evidence leaving me with no front plate.......... (Whats all that about I ask myself). By this time semi-human officer #3 has arrived and decides to over-rule #2 and let me keep said plate.....

Well here in lies the record I reckon. I left the DVLA office at 10.15, I am now clutching a Fixed penalty notice timed at 10.30. I never even got out of the car park before I was nicked, In fact I didn,t even get the car started, I reckon that taking into account time taken to get back to the car and change the plates I had my slightly dodgy plate on for less than 5 minutes before getting Nicked..........Pretty impressive I thought......lol

 

Thats one hell of a good story m8... Coppers hey! - well i thank you for informing me of the fine for a dodgy plate.... Think min is most prob illegal (3/4) but enough coppers have seen it and said nothing


Hope everything works out and that is a great plate.

 

Certainly impressive!! 15mins is truly amazing - No sympathy for the spacing thing tho fella - sick of folk flouting that law - the more fines and defective vehicle notices dished out to perpatrators the better!!
As for taking the plate - OMFG - that's unbelivable - no wonder his colleague reversed that - madness!

 

Just out of interest, was the car park one that is classified as being on the public highway? Some are private. If so then I would be suprised if they could nick you. You were of course just looking at what they looked like before replacing them with the originals!!! Just a thought!!

 

Can they do you, you were not on a public highway!

 

I believe they can nick you on private property. Traffic offences are still offences. You wouldn't expect them not to prosecute Ian Huntley (bad example ) just 'cos he did the deed in his own home. Not sure if they might need permission from the owner or a warrant to be there though, although they entered the property on the suspicion of an offence being committed

I wonder how many old people were mugged while they were dealing with a violent master criminal such as you

 

but by that token, surely show plates are illegal even when on private ground

 

Public highway = show plates illegal

Private property = show plates legal


Mightily impressed by response time of said plod.... next time some **** tries to car jack you, rest assured they'll have an equally impressive response time


Nothing against the police - i just dont like 'em

 

Pure Daftness.

3 coppers for a dodgy spaced number plate whilst some glue sniff teenager with an ASBO nicks somones car and a druggy breaks into a pensioners home to nick cash/possesions And they quack on about being underpoliced

And what about the do-gooder? Outside a DVLA office changing a number plate, oh please do people have ANY common sense these days?

 

When u read things like this makes u glad that our taxes we pay are going to some use. (NOT)

 

LOL

Worth the fine just for the experience aye Listy?

Copper #2 was having the last laugh ...the ***** in blue

 

If your not on the public highway, There's no case for plod

 

Dave, have you spoken to a laywer yet just to make sure they can nick you on private property?

And was this said number plate going on a Scoob?

 

Blimey - coppers turn up instantly to try to bust someone apparently stealing a scooby - and they STILL get grief.

 

...no they turn up cos someone was changing number plates outside the DVLA

 

Think it was the attitude of copper number 2 that caused the grief, not the fact they turned up

 

Old people get beaten up and robbed regularly around here, people murdered, intimidated out of their homes etc and the police were out measureing the noise from car exhausts a week or so ago. They were doing a report on it on the radio...........

Is this a proper use of police resources and tax payers money?

As for the booking you on private property as far as I know they can arest you for any offence, enter property, search you and a car park is public property. Your garden and garage is private property. Its somewhere the public dont go.

 

A car park isnt public property. The public have to pay to enter car park.

Unless the car park is adopted by the local council as part of their highway, then surely it isnt a public highway, thus no offence has been committed.

Do you get done for no road tax (exluding sorn rules) if you are parked on private property?

Do you get done for having bald tyres, if you are on priavte property?

 

steven, I was told anthing that was 'connected' to the public highway was counted as you could be prosecuted on it.. ie car parks..

 

Any area that the public have unrestricted access to (ie a car park) is still subject to the same rules of the road. If it was your driveway at home (ie not public access) then they would not be able to prosecute for dodgy spacing, insurance or whatever!

Matt

 

I spoke to Dave earlier and he said Coppers 1+3 were almost apologetic and couldnt have been nicer realising it was a genuine mistake made by a member of the public.
Copper number 2 however was severely p155ed at having his break interupted and decided to inspect Daves car. He walked round the car and found the plate and had such a smug little look on his face

How pathetic, Dave actually works in Security selling systems to help catch the thieving ******* that keep them employed.

If I were Dave I'd be severely p155ed off

 

Public place = ANY place the PUBLIC has access to on PAYMENT or OTHERWISE.

Hope this assists

 

w*nkers! Some Traffic police have been doing the Job for Far too long!

 

Guys,

Have read some very strange understandings of whether the car was on the public highway or not in this thread.... there really isn't a straight answer to that one.

The only way to fine out for sure is to contact your local council and ask them for a plan of the area showing their limits of adoption.... if the car park is adopted (council owned) then you can be done, otherwise, it's private ground and you CANNOT be prosecuted for such a crime - at least that's how it works in Scotland.

P.S. just to be pedantic - we don't have highways in Scotland.... just roads

 

Not Traffic this time just a wooden top with mega attitude

 

This could be interesting for the motor trade:
Their premises are "connected to the public highway"
The public have access without having to pay (First visit anyway! )
They cover, change and remove plates regularly!

Fight it, just to pi$$ No.2 off if nothing else, oh and use cash saved to buy a 'straight' well spaced set of plates to keep in the boot to use in the 'been to a show' excuse next time!

Si

 

Surely StarBug doesn't need any plates being a spaceship and all that...

 

True, but public highway extends to public places e.g. supermarket car parks etc. The same statute would cover dangerous driving in car parks, handbrake turns drink driving etc. If it is private property, your own drive, private motoring event (car show) then no offence.

I think seizing the plate could have caused him problems which, is what his colleague probably pointed out. It's acceptable to take a photo to prove the offence in court if you don't pay your ticket but there is no right for the plate to be seized.

There are many powers to seize items but, not in the case of a dodgy number plate. The offence is having an obscured/illegible plate which is simply the same as not having one. If you had no plate would he then have seized the whole car to help prove the case??

Its good to see that someone was bothered enough to call the Police when they thought a car was being stolen and they arrived in good time. Its a shame one of them was a bit of a w_nke_!

Final point, Dave Lister is off Red Dwarf isn't he?

 

asked my mate about this (and he should know - trust me!), he reckons:-

"A private car park is neither a highway (irrelevant to all offfences except stupid things like abandoning vehicles) or a road (road traffic and construct. and use legislation). It is however a place to which the public have access (so you could get done for due care, drink driving etc). So the answer is you couldn't get done for the number plate spacing offence...otherwise the pace car at Brands could get done for it !!!"

 

Take it you got the plate via a 'show plate' web site or some retailers in serious trouble due to the law passed last Jan regarding the purchasing of private plates needing certain docs.