DRIVERS have been issued with £20 tickets for using hand-held mobile phones in a police clampdown on motorists who are not in proper control of their vehicle. During a two-and-a-half hour operation in Gloucestershire, fixed penalty tickets were issued to six drivers caught using mobile phones, one reading a map and one eating a doughnut. A similar operation is due to be staged later this summer.

Although using a phone while driving is not an offence in itself, motorists can be fined or prosecuted for not being in proper control or for driving without due care and attention.

The crackdown followed the announcement of a Government campaign to raise awareness of the dangers of using mobile phones while driving and a call for a total ban on use of phones in cars by the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents.