Saltash Police took to the roads on Monday, December 11, to run their ‘Proactive Roads Policing Operation’ or Op Limits as part of their Christmas campaign. 

The operations, which looked to promote public confidence around drink and drug drivers in Saltash, was supported by the professional development unit, student officers, road casualty reduction officers and the Bodmin No Excuses Team.

It was run using three independent stop sites including licenced premises  and the Tamar Garden Centre who allowed the teams to use their car parks as stopping areas. 

During the operation, the stop sites were patrolled by a trained officer using a calibrated speed gun to detect speeding offences. 

Plain clothes spotters also looked to identify moving traffic offences such as using a mobile phone whilst driving, not wearing a seat belt and lighting offences.  

If any offences were identified by a spotter or the speed gun user, they would then be called into the stop site to be reasonably dealt with. 

Being a drink drive campaign, the motorists that were stopped were given a roadside breath test and if necessary, a roadside drug wipe also. 

Vehicles who were found travelling at 40mph and above were brought in for processing and those between 35 and 39mph were stopped and spoken to.  

The No Excuses Team were also active across the area in their vehicles stopping any motorists as appropriate, with active ANPR running.

• Eight roadside breath tests — all negative

• One roadside drug test — negative

• One non-wearing of a seatbelt

• Four excess speed of 30mph

• One lighting offence

• Eight words of advice given for 35 to 39mph speeding offences and one for unsafe/unsecured load.

• Two roadside breath tests — two negative

• One roadside drug wipe — positive resulting in an arrest, pending blood results

• One non-wearing of a seatbelt which also resulted in a failed eyesight test

• One defective tyre and found a child not in the correct restraint

• One non-conforming private  number plate with DVLA referral

• One carriage of goods likely to cause injury

• Six words of advice given for eating whilst driving and general vehicle issues

• Six breath tests — all negative

• Five non-wearing of a seatbelt

• Two using mobile phone whilst driving

• One defective tyre on a HGV that required recovery to be fixed

• One lighting offence

• One number plate not displayed

• Four words of advice given for eating whilst driving

• One roadside drug rest — positive (resulting in arrest at New Road)

• One excess speed of 30mph

• One word of advice given for condition and use of vehicles.

Sargent Dan Lewis commented: “This operation was run to try and make the public a safer place to be, especially with the roads being busier during the holiday season. Please be vigilant and report any suspected drink or drug drivers to the police. If you capture any poor standard of driving on your dash cam, remember that you can refer these to Operation Snap through the Devon and Cornwall Police website.

“Please ensure that your vehicle is roadworthy, your lights, tyres and wipers are working correctly. If you think about drinking one alcohol drink before you drive, that is one too many. The recreational drug you take at the weekend will still be in your system days later, is it worth the risk?”