Hurrying Harriet exposes Labour hypocrisy

Date: 19 September 2007

Guy Bird is our editor-at-large and political columnist

Deputy Labour leader Harriet Harman has hit the headlines again for her second speeding offence in four years. Last time, back in 2003, she was revealed to have been doing 99mph on the M4, but only received a £400 fine, plus £35 costs and a seven-day ban.

This time, The Daily Mail reports she might have racked up her recent speeding offence while campaigning to rally support within the Labour Party for her bid to become the deputy to Gordon Brown - the intimation being that her burning political ambition might have turned her into some kind of a speeding wacky racer. By the time you read this article, her case should have just been heard, and judging by the many web posts in response to the story, most will be hoping she will be handed more than a low fine and brief ban this time around.

Even though I don't know the circumstances of the latest alleged transgression, I for one, am not one of them. Yes, she's been caught twice in less than five years, suggesting she might have exceeded the limit on more than just those two occasions. However, the bigger problem for me is not her speeding - which judging by the first offence's mild punishment was not deemed 'dangerous' to other road users - but the hypocrisy of the party she stands for, which endlessly avoids practising what they preach.

'Speed kills', but not if you're the deputy leader, and emissions taxes are endlessly pursued to de-incentivise gas-guzzlers, yet the Prime Minister still needs a Land Rover Discovery. I'm not offended that she might have exceeded official speed limits from time to time because deep down I can relate to wanting to do very similar things. Speeding, is clearly something lots of people do a lot of the time, as the Safe Speed organisation sagely puts it: "As a nation of drivers none of us are up to the challenge of 'never speeding'. Speed limits are broken by judges, police officers, senior politicians and drivers from every background."

Short of retro-fitting 70mph speed limiters on all cars (not a move I'm in favour of but at least then there would be no issue on motorways) the Government should divert funds from penalising minor offenders to concentrating on better enforcement of visibly dangerous drivers through training more traffic cops to display good human judgement relating to speed in context - i.e. time of day, road and weather conditions, traffic density etc.

No, what offends me is this Government's increasing 'do as I say, not as I do' mentality. And if its policies are out of touch with many of its own Cabinet, it begs the question, who exactly are they in touch with?

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