Ex-Tory roads minister caught speeding in south London handed six-month driving ban

A former roads minister said he felt “great shame” in court as he was handed a six-month driving ban for speeding in south London. Guy Opperman, 61, already had nine points on his licence from earlier speeding offences in 20mph zones before the latest penalty took him to 12.Opperman, a former MP for Hexham, previously served as minister for roads and local transport in Rishi Sunak’s government.He appeared in Bromley Magistrates’ Court on Friday, November 13, where he admitted speeding in his SUV in Lambeth months earlier, The Telegraph reports.Opperman was caught doing 25mph in a 20mph zone in May.20mph road signsPAIn spite of his guilty plea, Opperman pleaded with the court that taking him off the roads would cause “exceptional hardship”. He told magistrates he needed to be able to drive his two children, aged two and four, to different nurseries. He said: “Clearly I feel great shame and guilt being here – I’m an idiot.“I’ve never been [to court] before, never committed anything in my life.”He said he was “very much in the doghouse” and added that his wife needed to travel to the US for work in March so he would have to single parent which would be difficult without a car.Magistrates overruled his argument and chair Susan Polydorou noted that while the ban was inconvenient, his circumstances did not meet the bar of exceptional hardship.She added: “You do seem to have a propensity to speed.”The former MP was also ordered to pay £560 in costs, made up of a £307 fine, £130 prosecution fees and a court surcharge of £123.The Telegraph reported that Opperman was seen cycling away from the court.In London, 20mph speed limits were rolled out by a joint initiative between local authorities, the Mayor of London and the Met Police to make roads safer for pedestrians and cyclists. Read MoreKensington and Chelsea and the City of Westminster have 20mph limits on all council-managed roads.