A man started the new year with an 18-month road ban and a fine today after he admitted a drink driving charge and leaving the scene of an accident.

Paul Lambert, 49, pleaded guilty in Magistrates’ Court to riding his motorbike while over the limit and failure to stop after a collision.

The court heard that police attended the scene of the collision in the early hours of New Year’s Day at the junction of South Road and Middle Road in Paget.

The driver of a car involved in the crash said that she was travelling east along South Road when an oncoming motorcyclist rode through a red light and hit her vehicle.

She added that the motorcyclist got up afterwards and rode on to Middle Road without exchanging information with her.

Police later identified Lambert as the owner of the motorcycle and confronted him at his Southampton home.

He told police that he had been out on his bike that night but was not involved in the collision.

But officers spotted cuts and scrapes on his body and also suspected he had been drinking.

Police arrested Lambert and took him to Hamilton Police Station for a breath test.

The test showed that Lambert had 173 milligrams in 100 millilitres of blood. The legal limit is 80mg/100ml.

Senior magistrate Juan Wolffe fined Lambert a total of $1,250 in addition to the road ban and ordered him to pay by the end of the month.

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