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148 
CARELESS DRIVING
Page 28
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The Government is considering whether there should be a fixed-penalty offence of £.60 and three penalty points for careless driving incidents that could be dealt with at the roadside by police without the need for court proceedings. This will raise the usual concerns about low-level fixed penalties and the disincentive to contest a case in court, a concern in the graduated fixedpenalty scheme to be introduced next year.
A driver may also be swift to accept liability at the roadside, offering an immediate admission of fault for all purposes, including insurance liability.
However, lorry drivers could benefit from this approach because court proceedings for careless driving, especially in more serious cases, can lead to more than three points being endorsed on HGV licences. This is because Magistrates Sentencing Guidelines suggest the driving of an HGV increases the level of seriousness attached to any road traffic offence.
The offence of careless driving is curious and unfair in this sense: if an accident takes place, drivers normally swap details without involving the police and the matter is dealt with through insurers; there is no prosecution and no points are endorsed. If the police are asked to, or happen to, attend, they may decide to prosecute, making careless driving accidents something of a lottery as thousands of drivers who are careless avoid any kind of sanction.
The Government believes that if police officers could impose fixed penalties for careless driving, then this may lead to greater action being taken against careless drivers, many of whom avoid prosecution because police officers are disincentivised to take further action because of the bureaucracy involved in that process.