A new RAC report, based on Freedom of Information data from police forces, has laid out just how absurd some drivers were being last year, and the headline figure is jaw-dropping even by motorway standards. One motorist was clocked at 160mph on the M6 in Cheshire. That is not a little bit over the limit, not a momentary lapse, not "making progress". It is utterly reckless.
What hits closer to home is the detail that on a 30mph road near schools in Culcheth, someone was recorded doing 80mph at around 3pm. Around school time. Near children. On a road where people should be driving with patience, not behaving like they are late for a podium finish. Another driver was caught at 48mph on a 20mph road in Alderley Edge at 3pm on a weekday, and another at 79mph just after 4pm in Barrow-in-Furness. Over in North Wales, one driver managed a frankly grotesque 89mph on a 20mph stretch of the B5129 in Deeside. These are not harmless lapses, they are choices.
The wider numbers are grim reading. Across 33 areas, 271,341 drivers were caught doing 40mph or more in 30mph zones. Across 28 forces, 32,548 drivers were caught doing 30mph or more in 20mph roads. So when people say there is a culture of speeding, that sadly does not sound like hand-wringing or exaggeration. It sounds like a straightforward description of what is going on.
And this is where the humour stops, because the consequences are not theoretical. Previous RAC research found speed was a factor in 58% of fatal collisions, with drivers or riders exceeding the speed limit behind 20% of all fatal crashes. In 2024, 185 people lost their lives where speeding played a role. Those are not statistics to be shrugged at, and they are certainly not the price of someone wanting to get somewhere five minutes earlier.
Rod Dennis from the RAC called the speeds "frankly chilling", and he is right. Chief Constable Jo Shiner of the National Police Chiefs' Council said the belief that speeding is acceptable points to a deeply embedded problem in driver behaviour. Again, hard to argue. If anything, the truly depressing part is that these are only the cases police actually caught. For every motorist flashing past a speed camera, you do wonder how many others are treating basic road safety as optional.
There is one encouraging thread in all this. Separate research found 86% of drivers support new measures to tackle excessive speeding, with 55% strongly backing action. The Road Safety Strategy published in January, the first review of its kind in more than a decade, includes a commitment to cut the number of people killed and seriously injured on the roads by 65% by 2035. That is the sensible part of the story. The maddening part is that it even needs saying in the first place. Roads in Culcheth, Cheshire, or anywhere else are for getting home safely, not for indulging the village idiot with a right foot and a licence.