Former Oasis singer Noel Gallagher has been ordered to pay a court more than £1,000 for speeding, despite never having taken his driving test.
The 56-year-old was fined and handed six penalty points for failing to identify the driver of the car, which was caught speeding at 41mph on a 30mph stretch of the A40 in Edgware Road, west London.
The High Flying Birds frontman was ordered to pay £742 and a £296 victim surcharge, plus £100 in costs, a court official confirmed – a total of £1,138.
The incident happened last October when the car was caught by a speeding camera, the Evening Standard newspaper reported.
Gallagher‘s case was dealt with at Willesden Magistrates’ Court on Wednesday under the Single Justice Procedure – commonly used to deal with minor road traffic and TV licensing offences – which meant he did not have to appear in person.
The star said that he gave up on learning to drive after one lesson after being mobbed by fans at the height of Oasis’s popularity in the 1990s, when speaking on BBC Radio 4 back in April.
He told presenter Zoe Ball: “I have had one driving lesson in the 90s and I was driving round a housing estate in Slough and she [the instructor] said to me, ‘if you just indicate and pull over here’ – then I pulled over.
“She got out the car she said, ‘I’ll be back in a minute’, she came out with her mum, she drove me to her house.
“Then the local comprehensive bell went and they all came out.
“This is at the height of Oasis-mania and I was like never, never again.”
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Gallagher was contacted about the incident in October and December last year, according to the Evening Standard, but as police did not receive a reply, he was found guilty.
Single Justice Procedure cases can be dealt with by a single magistrate remotely using paperwork.
Defendants who plead not guilty “have to go to court and give information to the magistrates in person” but can be found guilty after 21 days if they do not respond to a letter, according to the government website.
