KNOW YOUR RIGHTS
In this month’s edition we feature more road traffic issues relevant to the trade supplied by Patterson Law.
CHANGES TO MOBILE PHONE LAW - WHAT WILL THIS MEAN FOR PROFESSIONAL DRIVERS?
The government has finally announced imminent changes to the law surrounding driving whilst using a mobile phone.
New regulations coming into force in 2022 will prohibit nearly all use of a mobile phone whilst behind the wheel.
But what will this mean for professional drivers and what will/will not be allowed with the new regulations?
THE CURRENT LAW
There have been growing calls for a change in the law for several years.
When the law was first introduced in 2003, four years before the first widely available smart phones, all they could really do was send or receive messages and make and receive calls. Very few phones could access the Internet and even cameras were still an emerging technology. They were a far cry from the phones we know today that can do everything from watching movies to scheduling an entire working day.
The law that was created to prohibit their use was done so based on simplified technology that is quite obviously out of date today.
But the matter was not helped by overly complicated legislation. The law, as it still stands today, states that it is an offence to use a handheld telephone whilst driving. Simple enough.
However, the legislation continues that “a phone is to be treated as handheld if it is or must be held during the course of performing an interactive communication function…” which is then defined as making or receiving a telephone call, sending or receiving a message or a fax, or accessing the Internet.
In our view, the language of the legislation is unnecessarily complicated, and the wording: “is to be treated as handheld if it is or must be held during the course” is not clear and has been left open to interpretation.
Some police forces and courts would define the legislation as prohibiting any use of a phone at all if it was handheld, others would define it as prohibiting only interactive
78
communication functions, and some would even read it as prohibiting ALL use of phones, whether hands free or not. This uncertainty plagued the courts for years.
THE ‘CHANGE’ IN THE LAW – DPP V BARRETO
With the increase in smart phones and their functionality, something had to change. The most appropriate method would have been to clarify the law, to change it completely, or to set further regulations prohibiting certain usage.
However, in 2017 the government decided instead to take a different approach by doubling the sentence from three penalty points to six, and the standard fine from £100 to £200. Whilst this did discourage a lot of people from using their phone whilst driving, it didn’t make any headway in clarifying the law.
That was until the case of DPP v Barreto in 2019. Mr Barreto was seen behind the wheel filming an accident. He was prosecuted for driving whilst using a mobile phone and was found not guilty on appeal. The prosecution appealed further to the High Court – where it was held that the legislation only covered use of a phone whilst it was held in the hand, and only whilst it was being used for a communi- cation function (and not, for example, taking a photograph or playing a game). This was widely reported as a ‘legal loophole’, but this was far from the truth.
It was our argument (we were the defence lawyers in the case) that the legislation was unfit for purpose. If they found Mr Barreto guilty it would still leave this complicated legislation out there, with no definition of a mobile phone, what can be done with it or whether drivers can use it on hands free. It would also prohibit any use at all so would fail to keep up with emerging technologies. The Court agreed that our interpretation was correct, and that parliament only ever meant to ban communication functions because clearly that’s all phones could do at the time.
From then the legislation has gone back to Parliament to be changed, which has what has now happened.
THE NEW LAW
The exact wording has not yet been released, but it has been specifically stated on the
GOV.UK website what it will cover:
• The new law will prohibit nearly all use of handheld phones.
• There will be exemptions for making a contactless payment.
DECEMBER 2021
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90
