Guilty even if proved innocent

How do you fancy a scenario where someone else makes a mistake, but you end up being 'fined' as a result of it? And not a terribly unlikely scenario, either. Does that sound fair to you? And how about when, if you should be unfortunate enough to have this happen to you, you discover that the Police have an 'exemption' from liability for that, so you cant reclaim your losses? Welcome to yet another example of UK motorists victimisation!

If you've ever watched those 'Police Camera Action' type programmes on TV, you'll know that plod have long been seizing cars that are uninsured when they catch them on the roads. Possibly, like me, you'll be quite happy about that - uninsured drivers are statistically more likely to be involved in other crime, more likely to have an accident, etc. etc. What happens is that the vehicle is towed away - by a third party contractor - and stored in a 'pound' until the owner shows up with an insurance document to release it. The fee for towing it is payable before release, along with a 'storage' charge per day. If he doesn't arrive within a certain period of time, which is down to the contractor to decide, the car gets crushed. All sounds quite reasonable so far, doesn't it? Gets those bloody uninsured drivers off the road. But, here's the rub...

What happens when your insurer forgets to update the database which the police use to check if insurance is in place? Or he makes an innocent mistake, and puts in an 'M' where it should have been an 'N'? You get pulled over, and your car gets impounded, thats what happens. You think that because you carry your insurance docs with you (even though plod himself says its inadvisable to do so) you're safe? Nope, wrong again - plod has seen plenty of insurance docs that were taken out and then cancelled, so he'll only rely on his database, even when confronted with evidence his database is wrong. Where does that leave you? On the pavement, complete with wife and kids, shopping, the dog, who knows. So you get a taxi home for the insurance paperwork and then on to the pound, where they tell you that there's a £125 fee for towing your car! They couldn't give a toss that it was improperly impounded - they were called out, they did their job, they want their fee. Dont want to pay it? No problem, says the pound, we have your car. If you dont pay eventually, we'll either flog it or crush it.

What about when plod himself makes a mistake, and - for example - keys in your registration wrong when querying the database? Unless you happen to spot that and correct him, he'll still impound your car, and you have no legal recourse against him for the error later. It doesn't matter whose cockup it was for your insurance not to show up, the fact that it doesn't means that you will have to pay to get your car back. Plod couldn't care less. In fact if you'd like to argue with him about the rights and wrongs of it by the side of the road, he'll arrest you for a 'public order offence' and cart you off to the nick, where they'll take a DNA sample and your fingerprints to add to another of their databases. Yes, before you ask, they can take it forcefully if you refuse. And no, before you ask, they wont delete it if you aren't charged with any offence - there is currently no mechanism for removing data, irrespective of whether it was lawfully taken in the first place. Welcome to NuLabour...