While the Danes have to hand over 2,500 kroner to the treasury and live with a cut in their driving license, the Norwegians are ripped off for the same thing.
Here in Denmark, since September 2019, talking on a handheld mobile phone behind the wheel has cost a driver's license and a hefty fine. That's not how they look at it in Sweden. Or in Norway for that matter.
Quite the opposite, actually.
If you are caught driving with your mobile phone at your ear on the other side of the Øresund, the fine is just 1,000 Danish kroner.
In comparison, the same crime on our side of the Øresund Bridge costs both a fine and a fine of 2,500 kroner.
The 500 kroner fine is, however, an addition to the so-called Victims' Fund. This corresponds to a 150 percent increase in the fine size.
158 percent is too much, police say
On the other hand, the fee for talking on a handheld mobile phone both here and in Sweden is a pittance compared to the rates in Norway.
Here, the government has decided to raise the fine, which was previously 10,000 Norwegian kroner. It is now 10,450 Norwegian kroner, or the equivalent of 6,800 kroner. In comparison, it is 158 percent more expensive to drive with a mobile phone in your ear in Norway.
And even the Norwegian police think that it is too much to go after drivers in this way. In any case, the fine is now proportionately high, is the criticism from the Norwegian police.
– We believe that the rates are so high now that it is not necessary to raise them to maintain the preventive or deterrent effect of the fines.
"That's why we are against the proposal," said Director of the Norwegian Police Directorate, Runar Karlsen, to NRK earlier this year.
But the Norwegian government is not going to let criticism from the police stop it. The government also wants to ban drivers from driving around with so-called traffic alarms.
The government believes that it disrupts the work of the police when drivers have the opportunity to know in advance where the police are on the roads.
