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Early last month my wife was driving through roadworks when she was overtaken by a white Hilux at a speed we estimated at 60kph from on board video footage we have. We contacted the organisation responsible and recieved a reply and in effect admission of liability in the speed the driver was travelling through the road works that confirmed our speed estimation.

These roadworks were complete rebuild of the road with loose metal that showered the car damaging the headlight. Nothing in the letter refered to compensation or an apology for the damage so we lodged a complaint with the Police. On contacting the Police they have no record of the incident and further pursuit the Police have said they will not log the incident.

Can the Police just ignore this kind of complaint if the evidence is there in video and written admission by the driver?

Try sorting this out between yourselves. You should get a quote for the repairs first and present this to the other party. It should be fairly easy to sort out if they have already accepted responsibility for the damage. If you have insurance cover you should seek advice from them as well. The Police cannot force the other party to repair your vehicle but you can take your matter to the disputes tribunal to have it heard and a decision will be made.

I absolutely agree Donavan, and I will add the small claims tribunal has well trained referee's who do understand roads and the conditions and can quickly resolve the issue, I have used the service twice in matters of road accidents and was impressed by the adjudicators in-depth knowledge

This has two parts the fact our vehicle was damaged of which the repair is minimal. However the other party is dragging its feet because of Police protection it seems.

The second part is the Police have not acknowledged our complaint about the other driver despite onboard dash camera video footage and an admission of guilt by the other party in travelling at excess speed of twice the remporary speedlimit through roadworks.

This compounded more by the vehicle belongs to a regional council and was claiming to be acting to an emergency. The emergency being a none urgent scrub fire that was all ready in attendance by Fire Fighting appliances.

Safer driving comes to mind and we are trying to understand why the Police will not pursue the matter with such vigor as they do excess speeds and dangerous driving we hear so much about.

The Police have presumably labelled the incident a Civil matter, which means they will not get involved, I would talk to the regional council responsible, irrespective of the urgency, your vehicle sustained damage, my concern would primarily be one of safety, it appears the vehicle was being driven in a manner that was reckless to say the least and the speed restrictions are there for a purpose, I could find the actions of the driver of the regional council acceptable only if life and property were at risk, but as you say the fire was being attended to by the correct Authority (Fire service) so the urgency did not exist, the action of the driver could have posed personal risk to workmen repairing the road, for example were there attendants directing traffic that day (I mean the guys with the radio telephones and the stop/go signs?

Thanks for the reply sanjeet83. Have contacted the district council involved who have passed this on to the regional council (complex way of operating things) as yet two weeks on no reply. Yes their was workman on site, there was a traffic light control and yes the driver was posing a risk to safety thats one the reason we put a complaint in. I feel this is an unacceptable risk being taken and needs to be addressed, what excuses I have had back from the Police are in effect giving a licence to kill.

I might have let this pass except for seeing the video footage of the vehicle and knowledge of how foolish the driver was. Vehicles can be repaired but it could have been much worse.

Good on you, the issue is one of safety, yours as a road user and everyone else involved in the repair of the road, the reckless use of a vehicle being driven at speed with disregard for the safety of workers and the public is unacceptable, I am sure if you pursue the safety issue those in authority will buckle and compensate you for the damage to your vehicle, OSH could be a good option if all else fails, all road restrictions should at the very least be observed by the primary contractor.