I WAS driving from Southampton towards Nursling when I saw a police speed camera vehicle parked in a lay-by presumably to check the speed of passing vehicles.

While I accept that road safety is important, it seems that this is a tremendous waste of valuable police time.

It is well known that police have faced severe cutbacks and by their own admission are underfunded and under resourced.

From a personal point of view, in the past few months I have had my car broken into and items stolen. I have also been driven into by an uninsured driver and physically threatened by the driver of that vehicle when I attempted to exchange details.

On both occasions I was told by the police that they did not have the time or resources to investigate the crimes & the cases were closed without investigation. However, they can find the time for a minimum of two officers to sit in a lay-by for two or three hours watching traffic go by. This seems like a dreadful waste of police time & resources.

I accept that road safety is important but surely such tasks would be much better carried out by either the Highways Agency or council road traffic departments.

To use trained police officers to man spoof cameras seems a terrible waste.

David Rawlings

Southampton