Campaigners that advocate better driving habits are calling on the government to increase fines for talking with a handheld mobile up to one thousand pounds.
The lobbyists have asked ministers to increase the fine after a new study found that that more people are using their mobiles now than before a penalty was introduced, proving that a £60 penalty may not be a heavy enough offence.
Member of the Road Safety Campaign Brake, Sarah Fatica, stated that in order to make people more fearful of being caught the fine should be increased to somewhere around five hundred or a thousand pounds.
The study conducted by the Transport Research Laboratory showed that of the thousands included in the survey 2.8% are still using their mobile handsets as compared to 2.6% before fines were added as a deterrent.
The analysts in charge of the study which took place in London said that if the results would likely be the same in any other area in the UK.
Outside of the £60 fine for using a mobile set while driving, motorists that are caught receive three points against their license, which is up from a previous penalty of just £30 pounds before February of 2007.
After the new penalties were first introduced the amount of people who used mobile handsets while driving decreased by about half but jumped back up to the current rate over the course of 2009.
The most likely groups to use the sets while driving according to the study were men between the ages of 30 and 59 and women between the ages of 17 and 29.
On the other hand, at least progress has been made when it comes to hands free mobiles with figures that jumped from 1.2% in 2006 up to almost 5% in 2009.
