Velvet Glove

I hope so. The best thing about the way they played last week was that the Dogs made a comeback and the Cowboys stuck to their guns, scored a few more points and held them off. They played good footy and never lookd like a lucky side, just a good side. With any luck the Dogs (and they are that in the prison sense) will get done again this weekend. Their contemptible attitude with the Police and the community in general at the start of the year shouldnt be easily forgotten. They were very lucky there were no independent witnesses, two of them would be in gaol by now. Plus they have the only adult in the world with ADD......does anyone take responsibility nowadays ? Go Cowboys, excuse me straying a bit

I wouldnt put it past certain, shall I say 'redneck', elements very prevalent in our society giving her a better than even chance of actually getting a senate seat. I mean there is a long history of idiots being elected to the Senate.

Careful Gaza, logical statements like that will get you into trouble around here when discussing traffic fines and speeding :lol: Some people still have to fight with logic. No speeding = no fines = no points loss.........is it that hard to understand ? The constant excuse I hear for speeding is 'I am running late'. Well guess what ? They are even later when they get caught because of their speeding. If people plan theirs lives a little better they wouldnt be constantly 'running late'. I know things crop up every now and again that are out of people's control, but why is EVERYONE running late ?

Be careful, an American might get offended

If a curfew was imposed I wouldnt see it as a waste of time. It would be just like issuing any other ticket and, if the P plater was driving alone or with other P platers, would just have to make it home another way and leave the car there. I thought I'd heard that there was new legislation passed recently that said you guys couldn't just leave cars alone anymore, regardless of whether the driver has been done DUI, no licence, etc? Isn't the vehicle your responsibility after an offence has occured? Not the case at all. We customarily drive the cars of PCA drivers back to the station as their was some belief that we had responsibility, but it is more out of habit than anything else. If somebody wants their car left where it is then it stays. If someone is unlicensed, their car is unregistered or there's some othet legeal impediment to them driving, besides PCA, then the car stays. What happens to it after that is the owners problem. A new system we have (RAPID) reads number plates as drivers go past. If the car is unregistered, the drivers linked to it unlicensed/suspended or have warrants then we radio to the coppers stationed ujp the road to stop the car. One day it was done the area next to where the coppers were stopped up the road was literally turned into a carpark, with 20 or 30 cars in it that were staying. In short, for PCA offences we drive the car back to the station unless the driver specifies they want it left there. Other than that, unless its evidence, it stays where it is Cheers VG

I did'nt think it would to you :lol: I only speak English

so, if its only 0.27% of the toal revenue raised by a govt, how can it be considered revenue raising, or at least as larger proportion as people think. I mean, really, a govt could easily find 0.27% somewhere else. At least in the ACT they dont need the money from traffic fines. I really dont understand your point, other than once again its going in a well worn direction. So its revenue raising if they hide behind trees etc etc ? So if they dont hide then its not ? Spread the slow down message ???? I mean how many ads do you have to see on TV, how many prangs so you have to hear about in the papers before you get the message ? Do you need a copper to tell you that ? Your post just doesnt make sense

If a curfew was imposed I wouldnt see it as a waste of time. It would be just like issuing any other ticket and, if the P plater was driving alone or with other P platers, would just have to make it home another way and leave the car there. If such a curfew saves 1 life then it is worth it. I'm not entirely convinced either way, but I am mor in favour than against it but you have to learn to drive at night sometime dont you. I think if the hours of curfew imposed were reasonable, and provisions for special licenses for late night workers etc then it would work OK. Say a curfew between 10pm-6am and, if you need to drive to work, a letter from your employer or a stat dec stating your hours of work to get some sort of special licence that only allows you to drive directly to and from your place of work. Wouldnt be too hard to police at all really as long as the laws were reasonable

We dont do that in the ACT. If traffic direction is required we will turn up but as for just sitting there, no way. Unfortunately things like that can get inherited and gets done because 'we always do it' rather than any justification. When we had less people and more cops it wasnt a problem, now its the other way around it does seem like a bit of a waste. The idea behind cameras, methinks, is to get more Police doing stuff other than speed detection. The problem is that all these 'extra' cops we therefore should have simply dont exist, and we lose them faster than we recruit them

Dont worry mate, I agree with you. The more cops the better They have even used Police car mock ups in other countries in such a fashion. People's driving behaviours definitely change when they know they are being watched

Just about all pursuit cars still use radar. Any box hanging off the side of the car is still a radar. Laser is a lot easier to use and set up and, when people dispute it, we hand it over them and give them a go. Its point and shoot, its that simple. Radar does still get used but not as much as laser We have quite a few more unmarked pursuit cars nowadays as well, probably more so than in the past. Probably why you dont see them too much.

I actually didnt want to turn this into a debate about anything really, just wanted to get some info out there that suprised me a little. I agree though. If cameras are deployed in blackspots and have a decent tolerance (and I wont even discuss Vic) then they are fine. In the ACT they have a 10% tolerance (that is the fixed cameras or the vans). I give people about 15km/h if they slow down when they see me. In the ACT where the fixed cameras are, and where the vans target, are matters of public record at http://www.transport.act.gov.au/speedcamer...alocations.html I definitely didnt want to turn into into something that bags coppers once again. If you think I'm paranoid read the comment that has nothing to do with the thread regarding the ES day in Qld. I thought pilots got handed notes by hijackers before they took control of the plane

Here we go again ! I dont know why I bothered. If you wanna start that sort of thing start your own thread ****edit by ms700 because of deleted post*****

Soorry, yes my sh*tty maths. Its 0.0027 or 0.27% as u correctly state

I was motivated to do a little research into 'revenue raising' today and I'll explain why. Today I was doing laser speed detection at a known Canberra blackspot. I parked the Police car in the middle of the median strip facing traffic. Not attempting to hide and was visible for at least 600m to traffic on one side, and over 1km on the other.. I was sitting there doing what I had to do when a punter pulled up along side me and asked me if I thought what I was doing was fair. I mean this was straight out of the blue, and never seen this bloke before in my life ! I asked him what he was talking about and he said that doing laser wasnt fair. I told him to go away as I dont debate my work rationale with some 'random'. He then said I was doing nothing but revenue raising (some people had been cleaned up by a clown hammering along their street as they reversed out of their driveway during the week, one of the reason I was where I was, a fact he chose to ignore when I pointed it out). I then told him to go away a little more forcefully, as I was busy and, as I didnt pop into his work and randomly questioned him about what he was doing, suggested he shouldnt do the same to me. This got me thinking when I got back to the station about this constant argument I hear about 'revenue raising' so I did a little research into ACT government funding, and I'm sure it would run along the same lines as bigger states. Directly from the ACT budget ending 2003 I found that the ACT Government generated $2588M (or just over $2.5 Billion) in revenue. This was broken up into a number of things including fees, stamp duty etc etc. Of course traffic fines was amongst that. In the same year the ACT Govt generated $7M from traffic fines (including parking fines and speed cameras). Using my calculator I worked out that the ACT Government raised 0.0027% of their revenue from traffic fines. This is not a very large %. Quite clearly the govt doesnt rely on 0.0027% from the public to keep it afloat. From what I see it hardly really raises any revenue at all, in the big picture. So if you think that the govt really needs money from traffic fines then these facts may cause you to think again. Sure $7M is a whole wad of cash, but it pales into insignificance against $2.588B Food for thought only, lets not let this descend into another flame fest Cheers VG

OK, I cannot sit back and quietly read this crap any longer. This thread has obviously denigrated into the usual meaningless banter, but is there any need for comments like this. On one hand VG you get all upset and emotional about another famous stereotype in our community (that of the humble police officer) but you have no hesitation whatsoever in casting your own dispersions and classifying anyone that partakes in a cigarette as the scum of the earth (No you didn’t say that, but that is what you are suggesting). I am a smoker as mentioned early in the piece, and I am the type that will not smoke unless there is somewhere that I can without disturbing others – if this means standing out in the rain to satisfy my so called pitiful addiction then so be it. And I do not see this as the exception rather than the norm because all of my friends do the same, and in fact I have never seen a smoker that will deliberately go out of their way to blow smoke into someone else’s face as has been drawn into one of the other various stereotypical comments earlier in the thread. The fact of the matter is, this is the way that things are going, majority does rule and that’s a good thing. So unless anyone as any valued input into this thread then just leave it alone – I don’t donate (albeit small and somewhat insignificant contributions) to this site so that Chris can run servers to host the tripe that this thread has become. Trent. What piffle ! At no stage have I said or suggested that smokers are 'scum of the earth'. I used to be one myself. If that is the way you behave then good on you as you obviously have consideration for others. I have had vastly different experiences with having smoke blown in my face deliberately (and the miscreant ending up on his ass because of it). I also find them congregating outside the front door of just about every office building I go to during business hours With all the medical evidence around you would think people would draw a logical conclusion. I guess logic and smoking are mutually exclusive. Insinuating that I am insinuating is quite silly. I donate as well and, if I'm not interested I just dont read it. I realise it wasnt set up for my personal benefit, maybe others should as well....OMG am I insinuating again ??

Put this in your pipe and smoke it !! What is second-hand smoking? Second-hand smoking, passive smoking, involuntary smoking or exposure to environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) all refer to the phenomena of breathing other people's smoke. Second-hand smoke is produced during the burning and smoking of tobacco products. It results from the "sidestream" smoke which is emitted from the burning tip of a cigarette and the "mainstream" smoke that has been inhaled and then exhaled by the smoker. What is found in second-hand smoke? Second-hand smoke is a complex combination of over 4000 chemicals in the form of particles and gases. It includes irritants and systemic toxicants such as hydrogen cyanide, sulphur dioxide, carbon monoxide, ammonia, and formaldehyde. It also contains carcinogens and mutagens such as arsenic, chromium, nitrosamines, and benzo(a)pyrene. Many of the chemicals are reproductive toxicants such as nicotine, cadmium and carbon monoxide. Second-hand smoke is also an important indoor air pollutant. The United States Environmental Protection Agency has classified second-hand smoke as a "class A" carcinogen for which there is no safe level of exposure. Does second-hand smoke affect the health of non-smokers? Yes. There is substantial scientific evidence that second-hand smoke is a serious health threat. Non-smokers who breathe second-hand smoke suffer many of the diseases of active smoking. Heart disease mortality as well as lung and nasal sinus cancers have been causally associated with second-hand smoke exposure. Second-hand smoke also causes a wide variety of adverse health effects in children including bronchitis and pneumonia, exacerbation of asthma, middle ear infections, and "glue ear", which is the most common cause of deafness in children. Exposure of non-smoking women to second-hand smoke during pregnancy causes reductions in fetal growth, and there is also evidence that postnatal exposure of infants to second-hand smoke contributes to the risk of sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS). Tobacco smoke is also an important source of indoor air pollution, causing such immediate effects as eye and nasal irritation, headache, sore throat, dizziness, nausea, cough, and respiratory problems. How big a problem is second-hand smoke? It is a ubiquitous problem because people from all cultures and countries are exposed to second-hand smoke. This exposure occurs under daily-life conditions: in homes, at work, on public transport, in restaurants, in bars - literally everywhere people go. Surveys conducted in countries around the world confirm widespread exposure. One survey estimated that 79 percent of Europeans over age 15 were exposed to second-hand smoke. Recent data from South Africa shows that 64 percent of children below age five in Soweto live with at least one smoker in the house. The Cancer Society of New Zealand reports that that second-hand smoke is the third largest killer in the country, after active smoking and alcohol use. Source: World Health Organisation website http://www.who.int/health_topics/tobacco/en/ Does the council still need to justify itself ? Like I said, the perverted logic of smokers to justify their addictions is quite pitiful

It strikes me as funny that some people think that they need more points because they drive a lot, while I could find 20 mates who are travelling salesmen, professional drivers and the like who lose few, if any points at all. I drive about 40K a year in my car and probably near enough to the same at work. We can and do get booked in Police cars if we cant justify our driving, and the days of flashing 'freddie' and getting off a ticket when in your own car are well and truly gone. Speed cameras dont discriminate either In the last 10 years I've lost a total of 3 points. Its not about driving like a saint but being aware of your surroundings and what may/may not happen. If I am in a suburban area and cant see a sign then I'll assume the speed limit is 50. If I am near a school zone but cant see a sign I'll assume it's 40. If I'm driving down a main street I'll drive horribly close to 60 until I see something that tells me otherwise. What you have been given is some sensible advice about your driving. You say that all your bookings have been when you are driving 'carefully and conservatively'........well that's in your opinion. If you really had've been careful you wouldnt have been going so quickly. 4 or 5 years ago the amount of points you lost for speeding for 15-30 over the limit is the same as it is today (3). There may be more speed cameras around but, at the same time, you'll probably find less police doing fixed point speed work. That is true where I live. If no-one broke road rules then govts would get no money from it. The amount they gain in revenue is quite small when you balance it against other forms of revenue raising. Trust me, pollies spend no time worrying about speed limits etc etc. There is no big conspiracy here. It sounds as though you really need to look at how you drive and pay a little bit more attention to your surroundings. Your problem with points definitely puts you in the minority. I have friends that have driven in performance vehicles their whole driving lives and have lost no points at all. Its called involuntary taxation. If you dont wanna contribute, dont speed. Like I have said all along, I have only had one person to blame for every fine I've copped, whether it be traffic or parking...........me !!

what a swell party this is ! :lol:

You're making assumptions. I did not have alternatives to catching the tube. To be more precise, I had to commute from south of London to North of London, as follows - Bus to train station at Woking Train to South London (WaterLoo) 2 tube trains to North London (WaterLoo / Oxford Circus / Kings Cross) Train to St Albans Taxi to the Office. Trip took on average 2 hrs each way. Why ?, well I was banned from driving, so this was not an option. Buses were not an option, with the exception of replacing the tube, but this would have probably added another hour to the journey. And before you make another assumption as to why I was banned from driving, it was on medical grounds. I sufffer from petit mal....And if you don't know what that is, I suggest you look it up in the dictionary. Trust me my friend, I know what a petit mal is, and how it differs from a grand mal. I dont need a dictionary to look that up, my verbal repitoire extends beyond words of a few syllables....dumb copper that I am. You say buses weren't an option but then say it would take an extra hour on the bus. I am making no assumptions here, just staing facts, it is you that is assuming and that brings the inevitable consequences/ Smoking is bad, smoking kills (yes.....its medically proven). People who suffer from smoking related illnesses in this country draw valuable medical funds from those with sicknesses that cant be attributed to individual stupidity. Look at Jim Bacon, look at Yul Brynner and learn a lesson and stop trying to justify this pervasive (is it in your dictionary ?) and filthy addiction. Keep your points on toipc and stop being so personal and yes......this is out of control and should be locked off

"Here is another analogy. I used to use the London underground to commute to work. Every time I blew my nose, it was just black 'snot' - A direct result of the dirty atmosphere I had to commute in. Do I ban the London Underground for putting all this crap into my lungs ?" Ummmm........you voluntarily got onto a train to travel to/from work. Although it may have been difficult, you did have alternatives to catching the Tube. No-one voluntarily passively smokes. If people really want to smoke in public, in or near restaurants, pubs etc then they should be provided with smokers rooms (like Bangkok or Singapore airports) where they can lock themselves in and are annexed from the healthier non-smokers. I think the whole point is do what you want toy yourself, but when what you do affects others then some form of govt. should step in to stop it. Anyone who sits next to me at a restaurant will be politely asked to put it out as it disturbs me. If they dont, I will insert it rectally for them. Its very funny to see what lengths smokers go to to justify their habits

Have to disagree with you there Cro. If I want to have a meal/coffee/perve/tugg/whatever I have that right, as I do the right to have it without being affected by ciggarette smoke. Would you like it if a bunch of people sat down near you and started letting f@rts rip? A bit of a silly comparison I know because f@arts aren't actually harmfull to other people's health (possibly harmfull to the f@rter if they don't let them out!). Ross, if you don't want to be affected by smoke, go to the non-smoking area. But the smoke doesn't know to stay in the smoking area, it just drifts wherever the wind takes it so if I'm sitting near the smokers area chances are I will cop it. Another silly exaggerated example. If a bunch of nuclear technicians sat down in the "Nuclear Bomb Making" area at your favourite resteraunt and started getting all their Plutonium and other radioactive substances out and you were sitting at the next table would you go "That's OK, they're in the 'Nuclear Bomb Making' area, that radiation can't hurt me." ? I doubt it. Yes, I know very silly example and it would never happen but just trying to get my point across. By the same token if I came around to your house and you and/or your mates were puffing away then you are perfectly within your rights to and it is then up to me whether I put up with it or leave. The difference is your house is a private area, a pub, resteraunt, shopping centre is a public one ie the public goes there. This is bullsh!t. You cant stop people from smoking in puplic, that's starting to take away our so called democratic rights. Just like you have a right not to smoke, others have a right to smoke. So whats going to happen next, ban all cars near outdoor eateries because they produce toxic fumes !!! Personlly, I dont smoke all that much but when I do, I try and respect the non smoker by sitting outdoors, sitting near others that smoke, and blowing my smoke in the other direction. Threads like this make me regret having any sort of respect for these people because obviously they dont give a F*$K about the individuals that want to smoke. what about the rights of non-smokers ? cant have it both ways

its legal to drink yet we have drink driving laws. people should be allowed to smoke as much as they like but, when it affects others through passive smoking, it should be banned in the areas it affects others in my opinion well done mosman council. it is a filthy, dirty and disgusting habit.....and I used to smoke before, one day, I realised what I was doing to myself and stopped

"but I get the impression we are rarely near the action - thank gawd" Unfortunately I have a funny feeling our SAS would disagree. They are right in the thick of it, they're just not poorly trained cowboys like some of the other countries (read USA) there. They do their jobs effectively and quietly

Jamaica ? Nah mate, she did it all by herself ............................God I crack myself up