UK police target drivers in Calais

Officers from Kent Police will follow up a joint operation with the gendarmerie traffic section in France with similar stop-checks in Britain.

Based at motorway tolls and service areas south of Calais the British officers stopped vehicles to check for appropriate documents and to ensure drivers were carrying high visibility vests and triangles – adhering to a new law in France.

Three Kent Police officers, two gendarmes traffic officers and a French linguist from the European Liaison Unit took part in the operation which came after complaints were raised of British motorists speeding by the prefet of Nord-Pas-de-Calais.

The officers distributed English pamphlets with road safety advice for motorists in France along with 200 high visibility vests.

Kent Police’s Roads Policing Chief Inspector Roscoe Walford said: “We worked alongside the gendarmerie to give and receive road safety advice, learn good practice, help with language difficulties and observe French procedures.

“We work closely with our French colleagues in relation to serious and organised crime and this cross border road safety operation is a natural next step in that process.

“We can always learn something from our colleagues across local, regional and national borders and they can learn from us.”

Kent Police will host officers from the Gendarmerie Nationale in a similar operation in September.

Deputy Head of the Gendarmerie Traffic Department for the Pas de Calais, Lieutenant Patrick Vanderstraeten, said: “It is only right that drivers in a foreign country should take some responsibility for their safety by obeying the rules of the road in that country.

“These rules have the unique purpose of reducing the number of victims of road traffic accidents, which is too high every year.

“Failure to keep to the speed limit has led to four deaths and 13 injured on the motorways of Nord-Pas-de-Calais since the start of this year. Half of the speeding offences detected at more than 200kph in this area have been committed by British drivers.”

“The fact that you may be travelling in a foreign country should not cause you to be careless with your life.”

Photo: Jonas Roux