When Australian speed cameras were caught issuing 400MPH tickets to little Japanese cars that couldn't exceed 85MPH, they were reluctantly shut down for repair. The Police Minister maintains in an article today that without the cameras, people are driving like maniacs. Unfortunately for him, the facts just aren't on his side. Injury accidents are down 34% and non-injury accidents are down 14%, both over a time period comparable to when the devices were collecting fines.

The police figures compare Ring Road crash and injury statistics from 2002 and 2003 with data from the first 10 months of this year. Between January and the end of October, there were 60 crashes causing injury on the Ring Road. The year before, there were 91 injury-causing crashes and 70 in 2002.

Fixed speed cameras were turned off on the road in May when Premier Steve Bracks admitted that tens of thousands of drivers had been wrongly fined because of faulty cameras.

The number of crashes is also lower this year - 208 for the 10 months to October, as opposed to 243 for all of last year.