Although i would have done what you did for safety reasons and as advised by rule 264 of the highway code , ive worked on the hard shoulder attending incidents and know how lethal it can be.
Rule 264; Be aware of emergency services, traffic officers, recovery workers and other people or vehicles stopped on the hard shoulder or in an emergency area. If you are driving in the left lane, and it is safe to do so, you should move into the adjacent lane to create more space between your vehicle and the people and stopped vehicles
We used to have an unedited video they made us watch in training in the Ambo Service, someone on the hard shoulder who took 1 too many steps in the wrong direction and got taken out by a truck in lane 1…! You can guess the rest.
However, if he was tramming on the limiter at 56 and coming past you in lane #1 he is technically undertaking, but its a bit of a grey area.
Rule 268 of The Highway Code states: “In congested conditions, where adjacent lanes of traffic are moving at similar speeds, traffic in left-hand lanes may sometimes be moving faster than traffic to the right. In these conditions you may keep up with the traffic in your lane even if this means passing traffic in the lane to you right. Do not weave in and out of lanes to overtake.”
It is also acceptable in an average speed camera zone.
However, Highway code rule #267 states: “Only overtake on the right”
Regards Police action; If you undertake inappropriately, you could receive a fixed penalty notice (FPN) for careless driving or driving without due care and attention. This could possibly result in 3 points on your license and a £100 fine if it is a minor offence, further sanctions could be imposed depending on the extent of the offence. It is highly unlikey an RPU unit would even pay attention to 2 wagons with such similar speeds passing each other because it happens all the time, look at wagons as they overtake and how often the loaded wagon suddenly gets undertaken by the empty or lighter wagon going up the hill.
Your were just trying to be safe for what you considered a possible hazard, nothing wrong in that. FYI there is no legal minimum speed on the motorway unless it has been denoted by a blue circle with a white number.
As for general traffic on the motorway the othe half of Rule 264 is mostly ignored, lol. (Keep in the left lane unless overtaking).
The only thing ill say is, there is no such thing as a slow lane, its lane 1, 2 or 3.
