every K over is a buck for consolidated revenue

I read this morning on the ABC that the Queensland government is considering taking operation of speed cameras off police and putting it into private operators hands.

I notice they include a picture in the article of a police officer on duty with a gun, not a van parked on the side of the road (with the sign stashed out of sight of the traffic it is supposed to notify). Implying that the officer does more than sit around reading a book.

The Police minister says "about 100,000 hours of police time will be freed up if civilians operate the state's speed cameras."

Sounds very laudable, but I smell that its not about helping the police do their job, I suspect this is about balancing costs of operating the speed cameras and the revenue they return.

This view is interesting, as even the police union Ian Leavers says that "Once you give it to a private business, it's nothing more than about making a profit - it is unacceptable"


So, while the Police union thinks its ok for police to sit in the van and get paid for reading a book, they think that somehow a contrator will do a lesser job? I mean its not as if the officer gets out and flags anyone down for speeding, discovers they are driving without a licence | driving over the alcohol limit | some other offence ...

Many have criticized the speed cameras as doing little to enhance police involvement in road safety, even raised cases where people have gone through a speed camera to later be involved in an accident ... which could have been prevented had they been pulled over by an officer rather than just had their photo taken for an additional "road tax"