Sharing of driver data between EU countries is standard practice and related also to the UK when it was part of the EU. But how have tens of thousands of traffic fines continued to reach UK residents after Brexit?
We also review whether the new ‘EU-UK partnership’ deal signed this week will further facilitate this.
The latest related data available is the official ONISR French report on driving offences in 2023, published in October 2024 (the report for 2024 is not yet available). Surprisingly, this showed 62,780 fines were sent to UK addresses in 2023 despite it being listed as a ‘non partner’ country.
A number of other ‘non partner’ countries also received fines, but no single country was listed as receiving as many as the UK.
Fines sent to the UK in 2023 were mostly related to speeding but many were also for driving through red lights.
What are the ‘partner’ countries?
There are some 20 ‘partner’ countries, mainly neighbouring EU countries, which have signed agreements with France on data sharing relating to driving fines. A 2015 EU regulation created the basis for this and specifically aimed to make it easy to share data for this purpose. The UK was a partner country pre-Brexit.
Read more: What happens if a driver is flashed in a vehicle with non-French number plates?
The agreements say countries should give partner country authorities access to their national databases of car registration data so as to identify owners of cars flashed on their territory.
In future years the number of offences for which this may be used is set to increase, with the passing of an updated directive in 2024 which referred to offences such as dangerous parking or overtaking although it has yet to be transcribed into French law. This comes as France has also started to install AI cameras capable of identifying a wider range of such behaviour.
When The Connexion asked France’s Sécurité Routière (driving rules) department last year how fines were still being sent to the UK given that the UK had left the 2015 directive scheme, a spokesman said: “It [the report] clearly says the UK is no longer a partner since January 1, 2021, there is thus no information exchange with this country.”
We did not receive a response when we asked how it was therefore possible so many fines were still sent in 2023.
This is not the first time there has been controversy over the driving-related fines being sent overseas. Investigations are ongoing into how debt collectors for Transport for London were able to access owner addresses of French-plated cars driving in London’s Lez and Ulez low-emissions zones.
Does the UK still share driver information with France?
Although the UK no longer belongs to the 2015 data sharing scheme, it does still remain a party to a number of international agreements around sharing of data to assist with the investigation of criminal offences.
Official UK sources pointed us in particular towards rules on mutual legal assistance (MLA), as being relevant. They confirmed that these allow a number of foreign authorities – including French – to make requests for the owner details of UK vehicles, including for speeding fine purposes.
The network of deals that establish rules on MLA include a 1959 Council of Europe convention on mutual assistance and 2021’s Brexit Trade and Cooperation Agreement (TCA).
Under the current set-ups, however, MLA involves a French official applying to the UK’s Home Office to request the data, as opposed to having direct access to a database. Where appropriate, other UK officials such as the DVLA driver registration authority, provide relevant data in response to such requests.
We have learnt that records going back to January 2021 show that no driver registration information has been released by the UK’s DVLA driving authority to France under these rules.
In addition, UK figures for MLA, all countries (and reasons) combined, state that the country received under 6,000 such requests in the 2023 calendar year, so this does not explain 62,780 speeding fines being sent from France.
Will something change in the new ‘EU/UK partnership’?
This week, the UK and EU announced a set of new objectives following a one-day summit in London (the culmination of much behind-the-scenes work). A document entitled the ‘Common Understanding’ summarises the aims of this new ‘partnership’.
Read more: New UK-EU deal: What could change for Britons in and coming to France?
The document says the UK and EU recognise the importance of law enforcement and judicial cooperation in criminal matters and believe that there “is scope for reinforcing cooperation through quicker, better and deeper implementation of Part Three of the TCA and by fully exploiting and building on its potential”.
The TCA is the UK-EU deal, in force since 2021, that establishes the post-Brexit relationship.
The ‘Common Understanding’ further states that the European Commission and UK should “intensify technical work” by a committee on law enforcement and judicial cooperation “with the aim to further streamline the cooperation on MLA”.
Another section says the UK and EU “acknowledge the requirement in the TCA to set up automated searching of vehicle registration data”.
What does the TCA say?
Part Three of the TCA says (article 527) the UK and EU aim to “establish reciprocal cooperation between the competent law enforcement authorities of the UK and the member states on the automated transfer of…certain domestic vehicle registration data”.
It adds (article 537) that “for the prevention and investigation of criminal offenses…. states shall allow other states… access to data relating to owners or operators and to vehicles, with the power to conduct automated searches in individual cases”.
The wording of this week’s agreement implies that such measures have yet to be fully implemented, but doing so should become a priority.
The details would remain to be worked out but data sharing of driver information should in future become simpler and more ‘automated’.
Are fines still being sent to the UK now?
We await the publication of the 2024 ONISR data to check this, however information on France's Service-Public website suggests that it is not the standard practice (it differentiates between partner countries where drivers can expect to receive a fine in their home country and own language, and others who can only expect to receive on-the-spot fines if caught speeding by a gendarme or police officer).
We have also asked ONISR (Sécurité Routière’s statistics department) and the Sécurité Routière press team if they have any further information on how the fines were sent in 2023 and will report if a response is received.
In summary, sharing of UK driver details with French authorities has remained legally possible since Brexit, though in theory not in the simplified, direct manner allowed under the 2015 EU directive rules.
However, moving forward, full implementation of the TCA’s Part Three, reinforced in this week’s ‘new partnership’, looks set to potentially recreate comparable rules.
We note that among the provisions of the new 2024 EU directive is a rule banning countries from using private agencies to obtain information on drivers or to send out fines, saying that there had been “abusive practices” in this respect, with regard to the implementation of the 2015 rules.
We have not ascertained if any such private agencies have been used in relation to the French fines.
