MOBILE phone use while driving in North Wales went up by 40 per cent between November 2020 and October 2021, new research has shown.

Driving while using a mobile phone has been illegal in the UK since 2003 but last month, the law on driving with a mobile phone has become much stricter to cover advances in technology.

As such, Admiral Car Insurance analysed crime figures released to them via Freedom of Information requests to reveal how often noise-related offences are being committed by UK motorists.

Its analysis revealed that there has been a total of 1,432 mobile phone motoring offences in the last five years in North Wales.

These can be broken down as follows:

• November 2016 – October 2017: 341

• November 2017 – October 2018: 367

• November 2018 – October 2019: 278

• November 2019 – October 2020: 186

• November 2020 – October 2021: 260

Admiral’s methodology was as follows:

• Using a mobile phone / handheld device while driving a motor vehicle on a road is the offence considered in its analysis.

• Researchers at Admiral Car Insurance sent a Freedom of Information request to every police force in the UK in December 2021.

• They asked each police force for the number of mobile phone offences recorded by motorists over five years (between November 2016 and October 2022).

• Figures are represented by crimes recorded or Fixed Penalty Notices (FPNs) issued depending on the police force.

• 34 out of 49 police forces replied with correct figures within the allocated timeframe of three months for them to include in their final analysis.

For more information, go to: www.admiral.com/car-insurance.