It is nearly two years since the police were granted new powers to fine motorists for ‘hogging’ the middle lane of a motorway, but it’s only now that anyone has been convicted in court of this offence. A person driving a van at 60 mph on the M62 near Huddersfield has been fined £500 and given five penalty points for doggedly refusing to move out of the middle lane on to the inside one. Press reports of this judgment failed to say to what extent, if any, police have exercised their two-year-old right to give on-the-spot fines to drivers behaving in this way, but I have yet to hear or read of a case, and I would be surprised if there had ever been one. I drive at least twice a week along the M1 between London and Northampton, and I have yet to see the middle lane less than fully occupied by motorists showing no inclination to budge out of it, whatever the circumstance.
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