November/December Issue 59 - Flipbook - Page 15
NEWS
He said he wants them suspended
until Mr Shapps has reported back
to MPs next month.
The letter, sent on Tuesday, said:
‘How many more people must die
before you will make a decision and
immediately suspend the use of the
hard shoulder for driving traffic?
Enough is enough.’
A Department for Transport
spokesman dismissed the letter,
saying: ‘The letter shows a
fundamental
misunderstanding
of the work undertaken so far on
smart motorways.
Smart motorways in their current led to more safety measures being
format were signed off by then Tory installed.
transport minister Sir Mike Penning
at the beginning of last decade.
He said data shows there is a
‘mixed picture’ on smart motorways,
However, he has always maintained with higher injury rates than on
he was misled about the risks of conventional motorways but fewer
turning the hard shoulder into a live fatalities.
lane of traffic.
He will update MPs next month on
He also claims they don’t resemble the progress made since last year’s
the designs he signed off and that ‘stocktake’. Following the review,
Highways England has ‘casually new stretches of smart motorway
ignored the commitments’ made to will have refuge areas spaced
MPs on safety.
three-quarters of a mile apart.
A coroner last month warned smart
motorways present an ‘ongoing risk
of future deaths’ after two drivers
were killed on the M1 in Yorkshire.
However, motoring groups want
hundreds of miles of existing smart
motorway to be retro-fitted so they
are also more closely spaced.
The coroner said the lack of a hard It came as Labour stepped-up its
shoulder contributed to the deaths attack on smart motorways, calling
of Jason Mercer, 44, and Alexandru for them to be suspended.
Murgeanu, 22, in 2019.
In a letter to Mr Shapps, seen by the
But Mr Shapps said he believed the Mail, shadow transport secretary
coroner was not aware of a review Jim McMahon said action is needed
he ordered in 2019 which reported to prevent further avoidable deaths.
back in March last year and has
‘As soon as the Transport Secretary
took office he recognised the
concerns around smart motorway
safety and commissioned an urgent
stocktake of the evidence, which
we published a year ago - along
with a £500 million, 18-point, action
plan to make them safer still.’
Edmund King, president of the
AA, said: ‘To give the Transport
Secretary some credit, he is the
only minister to date who has taken
the safety of ‘smart’ motorways
seriously and has pushed Highways
England to make them safer.
‘In the meantime we hope he
wastes no time in making these
motorways the safest they can
possibly be, by retrofitting more
emergency laybys.’
Highways England is facing
possible manslaughter charges
over the death of Nargis Begum,
62, who died on the M1 smart
motorway in Yorkshire in 2018.
Around 44 people died on smart
motorways in the last five years.
Source:
https://www.dailymail.
co.uk/news/article-9221889/Westuck-smart-motorways-TransportSecretary-Grant-Shapps-admits
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