No more traffic police

[placidfemme]

Yushchenko abolishes traffic police

21.07.05 7.20am

With their voracious appetites for bribes and backhanders, traffic policemen are regarded as the scourge of the former Soviet Union but Ukraine's President has a solution: legislate them out of existence.

President Viktor Yushchenko has abolished Ukraine's state traffic police at the stroke of a pen.

"If the traffic police continue to keep hiding in the bushes with speed cameras and do nothing else, there will be no traffic police," he told a meeting of law enforcement chiefs. "You have discredited this agency. That is why I have taken the decision that from today there will be no traffic police."

Ukrainians should not celebrate too soon. The discredited officers will soon be replaced with a new state patrol service.

The best part:

"If the traffic police continue to keep hiding in the bushes with speed cameras and do nothing else, there will be no traffic police,"

How about an attitude like that here in NZ?

[T.I.E]

totally agree that is what new zealand needs anyway. scrap the old and re name them or something. just to lose the stigma from which they have today.

great idea.

[Motu]

It's been done already here - we used to have a special force called - Traffic Cops - they wore black with a special peaked cap and jodpers,a mustache was compulsory,and if you didn't have a chip on your shoulder one would be supplied as part of the job.They were disbanded about 15 yrs ago and absorbed into the Police Force - we didn't know how lucky we were....come back Traffic Cops,all is forgiven!

[zadok]

....a mustache was compulsory,and if you didn't have a chip on your shoulder one would be supplied as part of the job. We didn't know how lucky we were....come back Traffic Cops,all is forgiven!

Good one...

[placidfemme]

*must have missed the whole traffic cop thing*

Were they better than the cops out there now manning the roads or something? Why do you want them back?

[Motu]

The MOT (LTNZ) ran the Traffic Dept,but ACC had their own guys and they were real pricks.They were completly seperate from the Police,there was no confusion about who did what.Police could still haul you in,but you'd have to be doing something pretty stupid,generaly the Police were nice and polite,being stopped by them was warning enough and I don't remember anyone being ticketed.Avoiding Traffic Cops was a game played by young men,sometimes we won,sometimes they won...it was all in good fun they are now forgiven.

[placidfemme]

oh ok... thanks for explaining that

[Coyote]

What ever happened to warnings?

We need cops like in NFS Hot Pursuit. You could be followed by several Lamborghini Diablo Patrol Cars and if its your first speeding offence, you get let off with a warning. Instead we have Holden Mufti cars with a quota to fill

[Ixion]

The MOT (LTNZ) ran the Traffic Dept,but ACC had their own guys and they were real pricks.They were completly seperate from the Police,there was no confusion about who did what.Police could still haul you in,but you'd have to be doing something pretty stupid,generaly the Police were nice and polite,being stopped by them was warning enough and I don't remember anyone being ticketed.Avoiding Traffic Cops was a game played by young men,sometimes we won,sometimes they won...it was all in good fun they are now forgiven.

I'd have the MOT back. I always found them quite reasonable and polite. Mind you, in all my (rather limited ) dealings with the police , I've found them reasonable and polite too.

With one notable exception , years and years ago. And then it was an arrogant prick of a very senior police turkey being chauffered (sp?) by a minion. Gold Braid apparently took exception to the way I was punting the 3TA down Onewa Road, and intructed minion to give chase and stop me. Which minion did, stopping me just before the toll booths. Thing was minion was as embarrassed as hell about it, and went through a few perfunctionary, "ah, you need to be a bit carefull blah blah" motions, while Gold Braid yelled insults (seriously!) from the car window. MoT did traffic back then and minion didn't know how to handle a traffic offence stop. And couldn't think of anything to book me for. Nothing ever came of it, but that senior office was unfit to hold any position of public responsibility.

As for the snakes, I reckon they were OK, I think they've had a bad rap. Even the ACC ones weren't too bad, more liquorice maybe, but OK on the whole. The ones who really were arseholes were the ones employed in the little country towns. Back then , each city or borough council could run it's own traffic department, and keep the fines.

Police would usually only stop you for something like drunk driving or the like.

EDIT: Gold Braid was police, not MoT

[Motu]

I had something similar - I had a little race around the back streets of Otahuhu in an 1100,but when I got to Highway Mtrs they followed me in.He was the big chief of the Otahuhu Traffic Dept,forget his name,but he got into trouble in later years.Anyway,he got to show the new boy he was training how to throw the book as far as you can...prick,I thought he was having some fun.Like,how fast can you go in a Morris 1100?

[Ixion]

I had something similar - I had a little race around the back streets of Otahuhu in an 1100,but when I got to Highway Mtrs they followed me in.He was the big chief of the Otahuhu Traffic Dept,forget his name,but he got into trouble in later years.Anyway,he got to show the new boy he was training how to throw the book as far as you can...prick,I thought he was having some fun.Like,how fast can you go in a Morris 1100?

I remember that prat. After they closed down the council traffic departments, he took up as an immigration consultant (!?) and got into trouble in that too. He ahd a sweet racket going with the patrol cars, buying them from the council at book value and then reselling them (not illegal, just pissed off us ratepayers).

Like all the small council ones, if you weren't a local they did you for every cent they could. Unlike the MoT those traffic departments had to make a profit (So, what's changed then )

BTW he wasn't much of a chief. Was only him and a pimply faced youff.

[Lou Girardin]

I had something similar - I had a little race around the back streets of Otahuhu in an 1100,but when I got to Highway Mtrs they followed me in.He was the big chief of the Otahuhu Traffic Dept,forget his name,but he got into trouble in later years.Anyway,he got to show the new boy he was training how to throw the book as far as you can...prick,I thought he was having some fun.Like,how fast can you go in a Morris 1100?

Ernie Seath?

Nostalgia's great ain't it.
Who woulda thunk it, we've ended up with traffic pleece worse than we were.
It always pays to be careful what you wish for.

[Motu]

Ernie Seath?

The very same! As Ixion says he had his own little empire going there.My foreman knew him when they were young and said he was a jumped up little prick back then too.

[Lou Girardin]

Did you know that MOT were not supposed to travel through local body traffic areas unless it was unavoidable. We were definitely not supposed to issue tickets either, we were told to call the local cops. Couldn't take their revenue I guess.
Most of us told the bosses we had warrants for all NZ and would use them accordingly.

[Ixion]

Did you know that MOT were not supposed to travel through local body traffic areas unless it was unavoidable. We were definitely not supposed to issue tickets either, we were told to call the local cops. Couldn't take their revenue I guess.
Most of us told the bosses we had warrants for all NZ and would use them accordingly.

But, IIRC (though it's been many years) the council ones didn't have the same power in reverse. They were limited to their own council patch. Once you went outside the boundary, they had no powers. Whereas the MoT cops could keep on chasing you no matter where you went (persistent bastiges ). And council cops from one area couldn't operate in another council's area.

So if Mr Motu had shot over Ann's Bridge, he'd have been in Manukau and "safe" .