A WEST Meon motorist took a case to the European Court of Human Rights on Wednesday, which could mean a rethink on the use of speed cameras in Britain. Idris Francis, a retired company director, is one of many campaigners who claim that requiring car owners to reveal details of who was driving a vehicle caught speeding on camera, is a breach of their right to silence. The human rights group, Liberty, backed Mr Francis and another British motorist in the European courts in Strasbourg, after British courts rejected their arguments. Speaking from Strasbourg moments after the case was heard, Mr Francis told The Herald it would be several months - possibly as long as a year - before the results of the case were known, but he said he was "quietly optimistic" about the outcome. If Mr Francis and Gerard O'Halloran, from London, are successful in their fight through the Strasbourg courts, it could force a major rethink on the use of speed cameras in this country. Their lawyer, James Welch of Liberty, said if they won their case, the government would have to find new ways of collecting evidence for motoring offences. "Under current laws, a driver has two choices: either to admit they were driving, or to refuse to provide information on the driver," he said. Mr Francis told The Herald on Wednesday: "The hearing was quite brief, but it was very impressive, I had never been to the Strasbourg courts before. There were 21 judges hearing the case. Normally there are about seven, but it was decided to lift this case to the Grand Chamber, which is reserved for special cases. "I think our barrister spoke extremely well. I thought he put a solid case and, although the government barrister was quite eloquent, there were a number of things he said which I felt were grasping at straws." He added: "I believe, as a layman, we had much the stronger case and I am quietly optimistic." And Mr Francis had a message for other motorists who feel strongly about the way speed cameras are used. "We are now recommending anyone who feels hard done by, by the current speed camera procedures, to refuse to answer in court and to cite our case, to get a postponement." Mr Francis has been waiting five years for his case to come up at the European Court of Human Rights. Owner of five vintage cars, he hit the headlines in June 2001, when he was convicted at Guildford Magistrates' Court of driving an Alvis Speed 25 at 47 mph in a 30 mph speed limit. He was fined £750 and given three penalty points on his licence. Under the statute of limitations, he refused to admit he was the driver of the car. And he announced then that he would take the case to the European courts, claiming that the camera laws breached his right to silence under the Human Rights Convention. Mr Francis was back in court just over two years later, when he was found guilty by Aldershot magistrates of failing to identify the driver of his Jaguar Sovereign V12 saloon, which was caught on camera in Whitehill being driven at 41 mph in a 30 mph zone. He was fined £60 with £364 costs, but appealed in the High Court in March of the following year. When the appeal was dismissed after a two- hour hearing, he faced an £8,000 legal bill. After the case in Strasbourg on Wednesday, Paul Smith, founder of the Safe Speed road safety campaign, said: "And so the long wait for an important verdict begins. Of course, it's still open to the Department for Transport to do the right thing and pull the plug on the failed speed-camera programme immediately." Mr Smith, who believes cameras divert motorists' attention away from the roads, added that British justice was being "undermined for the sake of nothing more than needless mass prosecutions". The Alvis at the centre of the Strasbourg case has been in Mr Francis' vintage car collection for 34 years and he has driven it more than 60,000 miles. As well as the Alvis and the Jaguar Sovereign, he also owns another Alvis and a Bentley Continental. The Alvis has featured on television in the Ruth Rendell Mysteries and in Kenneth Brannagh's big-screen adaptation of Love's Labour's Lost.