Sydney - Australian officials pledged Thursday to stick with a controversial road safety campaign linking penis size to driving behaviour that one convicted motorist said was enraging men and resulting in road-rage incidents. In the television and print advertisements, young women who waggle their little fingers at speeding drivers elicit a shamefaced response from crestfallen male racers. The tagline is: speeding - no one thinks big of you.

Road safety officer John Whelan said the quirky campaign was getting results in changing the habits of young male motorists.

Whelan said traditional campaigns featuring blood-and-gore car crash scenes had lost their impact and a humorous approach would work better.

Simon Jardak, who this week was fined for damaging a car by flinging a soft-drink bottle at the vehicle of a female motorist who had waggled her little finger at him, claimed outside court that he had been "charged pretty much for being sexually assaulted by her."

Jardak, who denied he had been speeding or driving dangerously, made the bizarre claim that he shouldn't be held responsible for his behaviour if his manhood was impugned.

Harold Scruby, chairman of the Pedestrian Council, doubted a campaign suggesting penis size was in inverse proportion to driving speed would get drivers to slow down. He said money would be better spent "targeting offenders by using new enforcement technologies than making the community pay for these campaigns."