By Brian Nicholls

Last updated 13:58, Tuesday, 26 August 2008

THE style of driving favoured by many in the Penrith area is the one-handed, reverse cross-over method.

You must have seen it done no matter where in Cumbria you live. It’s where the driver has a mobile phone clamped to their right ear with their left hand while they try to turn a corner or go round a roundabout while changing gear at the same time using only their one remaining free hand. And they never seem to make a very good job of the manoeuvre.

Using a hand-held mobile while driving is a selfish and dangerous act. Those who do it do so deliberately and with malice aforethought. They should be banned instantly.

But who is there to stop them? Out in the backwoods of Penrith we rarely see a police officer and if one of our more diligent girls in blue (we only get women down here because we’re soft) catches one of these one handed tarmac terrorists the courts just let them off (or at least Penrith magistrates do).

I used to live under the mistaken belief that the function of the judicial system was to protect the innocent by punishing the guilty.

Penrith magistrates regularly do the exact opposite. They put the innocent at risk by letting off the guilty. They are absolute suckers for the old sob story from solicitors that a driving ban would cause their clients hardship.

So what? The whole idea of the totting-up system is to act as a deterrent to prats.

Some of those who avoid a ban are on their fourth offence but are people who rely on their licences for their jobs.

These are the very people who should have shown sense and not have gone on to commit even more driving offences. It’s their choice to do so. They are even letting phone-calling wagon drivers off now. Watching 38 tons in your mirror being driven one-handed and two feet from your rear bumper is no joke.

When you get 12 points it must be a ban with no exceptions otherwise what is the point?