DESPITE their best endeavours, there was No Excuse for more than 1,000 motorists caught flouting the law on Dorset’s roads last month.

From April Fool’s Day until April 30, 1,073 bad or careless drivers received fixed penalty tickets from officers at the roadside or were captured on camera.

Ninety-five were not wearing seatbelts and 78 were using their mobile phones while at the wheel, bringing the total number of offences detected by the No Excuse team since January 17 to 4,313.

Commenting on the figures, Dorset County Council’s road safety manager Rob Smith said: “There is no such thing as a ‘dangerous road’, as can clearly be shown by the excuses that drivers in Dorset continue to give for their careless, bad and dangerous driving behaviour.

“The road itself is not dangerous but a poor driving attitude can, and often does, lead to dangerous behaviour, and it is this that the No Excuse project is to working to change.”

He added: “If Dorset is to have the safest drivers and riders in the country then we need everyone who uses its roads to act responsibly. Those who don’t can expect to be caught anywhere, anytime.”

The No Excuse team, led by Dorset Road Safe, understandably failed to win favour from motorists who were caught after falling foul of the law.

But their efforts to cut road casualties have won praise from grateful residents in Stoborough, Sherborne and Gillingham.

No excuse for...

• A man who insisted he had just phoned his girlfriend, while behind the wheel, to tell her he would ring her back – a check showed his call had lasted six minutes.

• The speedster who overtook an unmarked police car at 86mph – in a 50mph zone. Officers recognised him as the motorist who had driven past a Dorset police station a few months earlier while on his phone and not wearing a seatbelt. He was given a speeding ticket and warned.

• A man who drove through a No Entry sign to avoid detection and ended up with two tickets instead of one.

• The speeding lady driver who said the road was quiet and she would have seen anyone walking out in front of her – she had failed to spot the grey BMW pulling out with its blue lights flashing.

• A man stopped for speeding on Dorset Way who said: “I don’t believe it, have you stopped me for using my mobile or for not wearing my seatbelt?” Officers, who hadn’t witnessed either offence, gave him a warning for using his phone and tickets for the seatbelt and speeding offences.