Special Reasons

With certain driving offences, even if someone is technically guilty of an offence, the court may still not impose a ban, even for an offence like drink driving, where a ban is usually mandatory.

If a defendant can state that he or she had a “Special Reason” which meant that even though he or she committed the offence, he or she should not be disqualified from driving.

A Special Reason must be directly connected with the commission of the offence and one which the court should to take into consideration when imposing punishment.

A circumstance that relates to the offender as opposed to the commissioning of the offence does not satisfy the definition of a ‘special reason’. So losing one’s job or not being able to look after a sick relative if given a driving ban is not a Special Reason.

Special Reasons can apply to the following offences:

• Driving without Insurance
• Drink driving
• Speeding
• Going through a red light

The law relating to ‘special reasons’ allows the court to exercise discretion in not disqualifying a motorist, or prevents the imposition of penalty points on a motorist.

Examples of Special Reasons might include.

• Driving someone to hospital while over the alcohol limit
• Driving to rescue a person from a danger and speeding to get there
• Driving whilst over the limit after your drinks have been “spiked” or laced

For the first and second examples above, the driver must usually feel that there is a genuine exceptional situation which cannot be solved by other means. So if someone else could have driven the ill person in the first example, then special reasons are less likely to be accepted, and a ban could follow.

With laced or spiked drinks, it must be shown that if the drinks had not been laced, the defendant would have been under the limit. In nearly all cases, this has to be proven with medical evidence from an expert in alcohol calculations. Our motoring lawyers have close links with Andrew Stephens (BSc, C Biol, M I Biol) of Formedecon, who is one of the country's foremost alcohol evidence experts.

A court will not allow Special Reasons where the fact that the defendant was driving was not proportionate to the need to break the law. The court will also bear in mind, among other things, the driving conditions, the state of the vehicle being driven, the length of the journey, and, in alcohol cases, whether a sober person at the scene would have recommended driving.

So, to summarise, a Special Reason must be:

• To do with the events, and not to do with the personal situation of the defendant.
• A good reason why someone should not be disqualified.
• Something done that was at the time and is in hindsight now a reasonable thing to do, considering all the circumstances.

To find out if your case could qualify, please call us for a no-obligation conversation on freephone 0808 1394880. We operate nationally, with offices in London, Manchester, Salford and Birmingham.