A crackdown described as the toughest ever by traffic police in Essex -- in which "whining excuses" were not accepted -- will result in 11,619 drivers being prosecuted for exceeding the 30 and 40mph limits in the county.

An Essex Police spokesman said: "Officers rigorously applied the enforcement standards approved by the Association of Chief Police Officers' Traffic Committee.

"They concentrated on roads with 30 and 40mph speed limits where there is a history of speed-related crashes."

Traffic police caught 5,852 drivers. A further 3,212 were spotted by speed cameras in towns and 2,555 in roadworks.

In the last campaign, in September last year, 1,551 drivers were dealt with by patrols and 210 spotted on camera, with 5,666 receiving warnings.

Commenting on the latest crackdown, which ran from January 26 to the end of February, Acting Chief Inspector Tony Ranyer, operations manager for the traffic division, said: "The whole point of the campaign was to reduce casualties, and we will not have those statistics until near the end of the month.

"These figures come as no surprise as we already know that 70 per cent of drivers regularly break 30 mph limits. We deliberately chose to reduce the number of verbal warnings we gave. In fact, we haven't even counted them in this campaign.

"We targeted 30 and 40mph limits in locations where we know there is a history of speed-related crashes.

"This was just the opening barrage in the war against speeding. In the months and years ahead, drivers must come to expect that if they are so careless as to let their speed rise above the limit, they will be prosecuted in Essex.

"The difference between 30 and 35 mph can be the difference between life and death for a pedestrian. The usual whining excuses we get will not wash.

"Speeding is not acceptable. This is about saving lives."

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