Well-off face paying heavier court fines

The middle classes face steep increases in fines for speeding and other offences, the Government has signalled.

Courts may be given new powers to impose far higher penalties on well-off offenders, the Lord Chancellor revealed in a speech last night.

The move would see highincome offenders paying two or three times as much in fines as people on average earnings who commit exactly the same offence.

Ministers believe linking fines directly to salaries would counter criticisms that wealthy people are effectively above the law.

But the plan is bound to be seen by some as a new form of stealth tax on the better off who are least likely to avoid paying fines.

Lord Falconer told an audience at Birmingham University: "We need to keep improving our enforcement of penalties, and indeed to ask whether ... those who can pay more do pay more."

Courts already have discretion to take income into account when imposing fines and routinely decide on lower fines for people on low incomes.

But encouraging judges to impose far higher penalties on wealthy people would mark a fundamental change in criminal justice policy.

Lord Falconer admitted: "Almost a third of all fines remain unpaid. Too many offenders are still getting away with it."