I've found that this seems to entirely depend on who taught you to drive, and perhaps to some degree where you learnt to drive. In rural areas, almost everywher

I've found that this seems to entirely depend on who taught you to drive, and perhaps to some degree where you learnt to drive. In rural areas, almost everywhere is NSL but you'd die in pretty short order if you drove at 60 on tiny rural roads. My instructor very much taught me that it's a limit rather than a recommendation, however, that's also balanced out with the minor fault of "making progress". Obviously if someone just drives at 5mph everywhere then they're clearly not a competent driver, but there's definitely a grey area. My instructor said as a rule of thumb, on a clear day, clear straight road without any hazards, you should be within 5mph of the limit on the test, but that otherwise, examiners are relatively tolerant of driving below the limit. As far as the police go, I think it's because people driving slow is generally suspicious of perhaps them being a drunk driver or some other issue with their competence or road worthiness. I was once driving at 40mph on a dual carriageway in Scotland and got pulled over, but I explained to the police that I was just low on fuel due to a number of closed petrol stations, so I'm trying to conserve fuel by driving at the speed I get the best economy otherwise I won't make it to Inverness. They were completely satisfied with that and let me on my way.