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Road Safety Cuts Will Put More Lives At Risk, Police Chief Warns
Mon, 09 Aug 2010

The Government has been warned that plans to cut funding for speed cameras will result in more people being killed on the nation’s roads.

The Department of Transport has recently cut £38m from this year's road safety budget and has axed central funding for new fixed speed cameras .

However, chief constable Mick Gianassi, the most senior traffic policeman in Britain, has written to road safety minister Mike Penning MP warning of a rise in fatal road accidents as councils switch off cameras because they cannot afford to operate them.

"The evidence is that road safety camera partnerships have resulted in significant reductions in road casualties over the past decade," he said while speaking on BBC Radio Four's Today show.

"There are almost half the number of casualties that there were eight years ago, and actually there is very clear evidence to show that the public accepts them."

"We recognise that we have to save money, we recognise that road safety has to play a part of that, but these cuts are a particular threat to the sustainability of the system."

Gianassi added that he his "working with the Government to persuade them that action needs to be taken to protect the system and the future of our road safety ".

Last month, Oxfordshire council confirmed it will switch off its 72 speed cameras to save money and neighbouring authority, Buckinghamshire County Council, looks set to follow suit. Wiltshire and Derbyshire plan to reduce their speed camera networks, while Dorset and Norfolk councils are currently reviewing theirs.

Research published last week suggested that Britain’s speed cameras may have caused nearly 28,000 road accidents in the UK since 2001.

The study, carried out by insurer LV=, revealed that one in 100 motorists has had an accident after taking their eyes off the road to check their speed or braking suddenly when in sight of a camera.
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