Flash the cash The news that Oxfordshire’s speed cameras are to be turned back on came as little surprise. The reason they were switched off, we were told, was financial, with Oxfordshire County Council withdrawing £600,000 funding to the Thames Valley Safer Roads Partnership.

So while cameras were still maintained in Buckinghamshire and Berkshire, Oxfordshire’s were all turned off.

We have had no details yet of the deal that has apparently been struck which will lead to the reactivation of the cameras, nor a date when they will be turned back on.

Given the short period of time that the cameras have been turned off, it is also unlikely if we will ever know whether turning off the cameras led to an increase in road casualties.

What we can be sure of, is that turning the cameras off led to a large drop in income for the Exchequer.

Last month, the Safer Roads Partnership issued some statistics which backed up the general suspicion that some speed camera sites were huge cash generators.

One camera, in Shirburn Road, Watlington, was said to catch an average of 25 motorists an hour between 2007 and 2009.

Over the same period, another, on the A40 at Barnard Gate, caught about 95 motorists a day breaking the 60mph speed limit.

With a speeding fine at £60, it doesn’t take a genius to work out that these two devices alone were capable of generating a huge amount of income. Yes that income went straight to the Treasury, not to our local authorities, but the potential loss of that steady flow of cash undoubtedly caused a ripple somewhere.

As we said in the summer when the cameras were switched off, one aspect of the speed camera system that appeared to have been overlooked was that it gave many drivers a rare dose of advanced driver education.

Most drivers pass their test and never consider taking further training. But many of those caught travelling a few miles over the speed limit were offered a chance to undertake a short course to bring home the effect of speeding, rather than suffering a fine and points on the licence.

For many, this enforced training session was the only advanced driver training they had had since passing their test. And most of those who attended one of these sessions said they found it useful and said it had altered their attitude to speed.

And, as we have said before, the only truly effective speed limiter remains the one inside your head.