Speed cameras are generating profits of more than £20m a year for the Chancellor. The actual take, £112m, has doubled in a year and there are reports that roving units, hidden in police vehicles, motorcycles and vans, have increased by a third in a year. There is certainly an argument that these cameras save lives, although fines and penalty points can be imposed for being just a mile or two over the limit, but there are other areas where our pockets are being quietly picked which seem to have less justification. I was moved to look into this by something which happened last week. I was in London to do some filming on the streets and we parked at 7.55am in a central area surrounded by apartment buildings. There was a long row of parked cars, left overnight by people living in the area. Until 8am parking was free, after 8am they needed tickets. A warden was standing by as we drew up. We fed our meter. It was 7.57am. As 8 o'clock struck he started ticketing. At 8.01am perspiring owners appeared in the distance, running, but too late. As he saw them he worked faster, anxious to net as many victims as possible before they could ticket their escape. The whole thing struck me as mean and not what you would expect in a civilised society. I wondered if he was just a nasty man or a nice man under pressure to meet a target imposed from above. Of course, indiscriminate parking causes problems, especially for unfortunate householders near to shops or sporting arenas, and there must be rules. But rules applied with reason tend to be less resented than those rules where a sliver of malice appears to lie in the implementation. A report last week told of violence meted out to traffic wardens in London. No excuse for that, but why increase drivers' exasperation unnecessarily? One motorist with a 44-year clean record was caught on camera twice in an hour on his way to and from home. He was doing 39mph in a 30mph zone. Undoubtedly wrong, but did it deserve the £120 fine and six penalty points, which then added £90 to his insurance premium? I doubt a court would have been so severe, but instant justice knows no moderation. Last week, in the House of Commons, a Lib Dem MP asked a minister in the Department of Transport how much loot was raised by car parking charges. The answer was that the annual takings from local authority car parks was £638m. Half as much again as 10 years ago. Either there are 50pc more drivers now or charges are being stealthily increased because someone has tumbled to the fact that we will pay because we have no option. OK, the able-bodied can use the bus and perhaps that's what authority wants, but what about the disabled, the elderly and mums with kids? Or housewives with the weekly shop in carrier bags? Now richer-than-Croesus banks want to charge us for withdrawing our own money or rather, they're going to close some of their outlets and force us to use run-for-profit hole in walls. What will we have to pay for next? Breath? ********** Unease over campaign I'm a bit uneasy about the campaign being waged against Education Secretary Ruth Kelly because of her alleged membership of the ultra-religious Opus Dei. She stoutly defended herself on Radio 4 last week, saying she would implement Government policy regardless of her own beliefs. Until her actions display the contrary I'm prepared to give her the benefit of the doubt. There have been many, many ministers whose private lives left a lot to be desired but who still governed wisely. Comp-ared with what some of them got up to, being a fervent Catholic seems small beer. ********** Too frightened to look into future Be afraid. Be very afraid. French scientists say they have invented a mirror which can show you what the ravages of time - and booze and fags and too much telly from your armchair - will do to you. A sophisticated software package will monitor your behaviour and then show you where you're heading. A prototype will be ready this summer. Him Indoors, who has none of my bad habits and worries about my health, will probably buy me one for Christmas. Unless he remembers my capacity for wreaking vengeance. That should stop him! ********** Ladybirds are under threat Scientists are warning that polar bears, ptarmigans and even the Inuit culture are doomed to extinction if global pollution continues. In fact, it's probably already too late. The idea of no polar bears is bad enough but we're also warned that the humble ladybird, that magic insect of childhood, is waking too soon from its winter hibernation because of global warming and faces death by starvation because its food, the aphid, remains asleep. I still feel a thrill when I see a ladybird, quiver with pleasure if one crawls on to my finger and think no garden complete without them. To think of future generations viewing them much as I view the extinct dodo doesn't bear thinking about. ********** Supplies for free! A large diy chain has informed its suppliers, some of them small businesses, that it expects them to give it stock for free. Their memo reads: "With immediate effect we will require all suppliers to provide all stock fill for new stores' free of charge. This will include up to 20 new stores for the next calendar year." It also says suppliers will have to fund the stores' 10pc discount days, which means that the big fella will actually be giving you nothing, the little fellas will. One grower who supplies the firm's garden centres called their action "bullying". I call it something far stronger and reminiscent of the days of the robber barons. The Office of Fair Trading says the issue isn't big enough to warrant investigation. If government isn't there to stop things like this, what is it for? ********** Not so good dads For a long time now I've espoused the right of a good father to see his children after marital break-up. But the emphasis is on the word "good". If a man has been emotionally or physically abusive to the mother of those children he loses any rights as far as I'm concerned. Neither am I moved by the weeping of men for lost children to whose upkeep they have not contributed a penny - unless, of course, real deprivation made this impossible. Disturbing stories are reaching me of men who, having smashed their relationships to smithereens by their own actions, are pursuing custody battles as yet one more episode in the war against their exes because fathers' rights are now a hot issue. Apart from the immense distress this causes their former partners, and probably the children, it damages the cause of the good fathers - and there are many - who only want the right to see their children; men who may have been completely innocent victims of marriage break-up. I can't believe it's beyond the wit of the courts to see through ploys like this and make sure that justice is done - to everyone. ********** I'm feeling pretty jaded about the world at the moment. Everywhere - or so it seems - you see man's inhumanity to man, the pettiness of politicians or the utter emptiness of much of our current culture. Last week, looking at the pictures of those two young firemen, both on the threshold of marriage, who died trying to save a total stranger, I could almost believe there's hope for the human race after all. * Denise Robertson cannot enter into any personal correspondence. | 
