A DRIVER stopped by police for speeding asked: “Are you the officer that stopped me just before?”

Unbelievably, he had been stopped just minutes earlier by an officer from the Dorset Road Safe Partnership’s No Excuse Team for another offence.

The incident was just one of 7,000 traffic-related offences detected by the team in the past four months on Dorset roads.

Of those, around 17 per cent failed to wear a seatbelt and 14 per cent used a mobile phone while driving.

Many of the offences could easily have led to death or serious injury to the drivers themselves or others, say police.

One woman in Sherborne burst into tears when she was caught speeding in the morning and not wearing her seatbelt in the afternoon – but was still handed two tickets.

Another driver who attempted to nip down a No Entry road received a ticket from officers in the unmarked No Excuse car parked near the sign.

One driver caught using his mobile phone on the Wessex Way told officers he thought the offer of a re-education course to be too lenient for his offence... but accepted it anyway.

A lorry driver in Poole stopped for not wearing a seatbelt told officers he had only travelled a short distance but had in fact travelled more than a mile.

The No Excuse project continues to seek to make Dorset’s roads safer by improving driver behaviour, clamping down on offences likely to increase the risk of collision or which could result in more serious injuries or death.