Western Australia Party MP Charles Smith defiant over car’s radar detector ahead of long-awaited WA ban

A State MP who refused to support a long-awaited ban on radar detectors is using one of the devices in his high performance car. Charles Smith, a former police officer, last week told Parliament’s Upper House that he believed drivers who used radar detectors “drive more slowly”. “People tend to drive more slowly when they are pinged with these devices; they slow down. I am concerned that the Government is treating police and road safety as a way to gouge motorists,” he said. What Mr Smith did not mention in his speech was that he had a detector on the dashboard of his white Kia Stinger parked outside Parliament House. The devices detect speed cameras from several hundred metres away and give a driver time to slow down to avoid being caught. There have been plans to outlaw the technology in WA for three decades and they have been banned in every other jurisdiction since 2000. Under laws passed last week, anyone caught driving a vehicle fitted with a radar detector faces a $3200 fine. A second would attract a fine of $4800. But the the offence won’t come into effect until the Bill is given royal assent by WA Governor Kim Beazley and Mr Smith told The West Australian he would continue to use his radar detector until then. Mr Smith, who was not the only MP to speak against the ban, said he was “extremely concerned” this newspaper knew the make and model of his car “and the contents therein”. He said he would ask Legislative Council President Kate Doust “to investigate this matter further as this is a clear breach of my personal privacy and a blatant intrusion”. After declining to speak on the phone, the MLC for the East Metropolitan Region said in an email that disclosure was not a requirement of parliamentary debate. “I use a radar detector as a precautionary measure to check my speed as I travel thousands of kilometres in my vast electorate,” Mr Smith wrote. “Use of a detector is legal until Royal Assent of the Bill. I of course will have the device removed once The Governor has signed the Bill into Law. “With $500 million added to the road camera account in the last State budget rather than policing, it is obvious the Government see motorists as a revenue source to be gouged rather than encouraging them to drive safely.” Police and Road Safety Minister Michelle Roberts said she would be “very surprised” if any member of Parliament was “so irresponsible” as to have a radar detector. “They’ve been illegal for 20 years in every other State, for good reason,” Ms Roberts said. “There is only one reason to have a radar detector in a vehicle and that is so people can speed without being detected.” Mr Smith told Parliament he took “road safety extremely seriously” and in his past career he had personally seen the consequences of drink and drug drivers. Mr Smith was first elected in 2017 as a One Nation MP and quit Pauline Hanson’s party two years later to sit as an Independent. Last October he was announced as the deputy leader of a new political party, Reform WA, but in June joined the Western Australia Party.