What price a life? Killer driver gets £87 costs and 10 points

What price a cyclist's life? According to one judge, £87 in costs, 10 penalty points and a community service order ought to do it. That's the penalty handed to Hannah James, 31, of Disraeli Road, Putney.

According to the Wandsworth Guardian, a 17-year old boy, Joel Semmens, cycling home through Byfleet, was hit by James' black Audi TT and later died in hospital from his injuries.

James failed to stop at the scene of the accident and was later found to be using an 'unsuitable' tyre.

She pleaded guilty to all charges, but for some inexplicable reason the magistrate merely handed her 100 hours community work, fined her £87 in costs, and slapped 10 penalty points on her driving licence.

In any collision with a car the cyclist is always going to come off worst. This is why I believe that in any accident involving a cycle, it should be absolutely and incontrovertibly the motorist's responsibility.

Other countries already automatically assume the motorist, protected by a two tonne metal cage, to be at fault in an accident with a cyclist, protected by at most a small polystyrene hat.

Why not the UK?

In my view, failure to stop at the scene of an accident means the CPS ought to have sought to prosecute James for manslaughter at the very least.

She should have been sentenced to a lengthy jail term and banned from driving for a considerable time.

But £87 and a community service order? That sentence is a travesty, a cruel mockery of Joel Semmens' life and an insult to all cyclists. Is that what our lives are worth in this country?