Tag: road safety

• Ministers fail to publish road safety strategy

  The Government appears to have missed its own target of publishing its new and widely trailed road safety strategy “this year”.

  

  I have written extensively on this blog about the varying commitment to publish the strategy, as well as the boast from ministers that it will be “the first for ten years”.

  As early as 11 December – less than two weeks ago – asked directly by Tory MP Andrew Griffith when the strategy would be published, transport minister Lilian Greenwood said:

  The Government intends to publish the Road Safety Strategy this year.

  But, with Parliament sitting and just a day before Christmas, there has been a wobble, with Greenwood telling Green Party MP Ellie Chowns this week:

  My Department is developing our road safety strategy and we will set out more details in due course.

  As I have noted in relation to smart motorway evaluation reports, ministers sometimes say they are working on things when they have simply chosen not to publish them, but the idea that officials are still putting the strategy together – or ministers are arguing over the content with No 10 – is mind blowing.

  Greenwood also told Labour MP Juliet Campbell:

  We are considering a range of policies under the new Road Safety Strategy; the first for ten years. Details on this will be published shortly.

  I think that you can safely say that if ministers say they intend to do something and then don’t do it, you have failed.

  2025.12.24

• Did Lightwood exaggerate speed camera fix?

  The Daily Mail has reported that National Highways is some way off identifying and implementing a permanent solution to the issue that led to thousands of drivers being wrongly clocked for speeding on smart motorways.

  The paper picks up on yesterday’s statement from roads minister Simon Lightwood and in particular the revelation that the problem was fully identified in October and prosecutions halted, adding that “speed camera enforcement on smart motorways was secretly switched off two months ago”.

  Lightwood also said:

  A Home Office-approved solution to this issue has now been agreed. National Highways will be working with the police to allow them to implement this solution as a priority.

  

  However, the Mail reports:

  But it has emerged that National Highways still does not fully understand how the fault occurred and a permanent solution won’t be found until next year. 

  In the meantime, when the camera enforcement system is switched back on, National Highways will have to provide daily updates to police on the times when they believe the camera system is not functioning properly.

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  2025.12.18

• Lightwood makes light of speed camera snafu

  Roads minister Simon Lightwood has claimed that drivers who break the law “can expect to be punished”, despite confirming that tens of thousands of drivers have got away with speeding offences because of National Highways’ latest technology failure on smart motorways.

  

  In written parliamentary statement, Lightwood confirmed, but sought to play down, the fact that an “anomaly” over the settings on variable speed limit enforcement cameras occurred approximately 2,650 times over four years, leading to a similar number of wrongful prosecutions.

  But that’s only half the story. As Lightwood told MPs:

  Independently, the National Police Chiefs’ Council took action to instruct all affected police forces to cancel wider prosecutions related to infringements in progress, regardless of whether they were impacted by this issue. As a result, tens of thousands of people’s speed awareness courses are being cancelled, and thousands of historic fixed penalty notices and criminal justice prosecutions are being discontinued.

  Lightwood also explained why his department had covered the problem up for around three months, without explicitly stating that it had done so:

  Throughout this process, I have been clear with all partners that we must ensure our road network remains safe. We therefore took the decision, following a safety assessment from National Highways, not to undermine public confidence in enforcement and risk impacting driver behaviour before we had a solution to this issue approved and ready to roll out.

  He ended his statement with an assertion that the facts have proven to be wholly untrue.

  Compliance with the law is being enforced in a variety of ways across our roads, as has always been the case. If you break the law, you can expect to be punished.

  As I commented yesterday, if tens of thousands of drivers breaking the law cannot be prosecuted because smart motorway technology is, once again, not up to the job, that is a major safety issue.

  2025.12.17

• National Highways races to play down speed camera cock-up

  The revelation that thousands of drivers have been wrongly prosecuted because speed cameras on smart motorways and elsewhere had the wrong settings is a major embarrassment for National Highways, which is why it is, typically, trying to play it down.

  I’m not sure it will boost confidence that the issue has only been admitted by the government-owned company and the Department for Transport (DfT) after a so-called fix has been put in place, but here is the headline on the National Highways press release:

  Fix being rolled out after variable speed camera anomaly

  As the Daily Mail points out:

  The scandal will yet again raise concerns about the safety of smart motorways, which are stretches of road where variable speed camera technology is used to manage traffic flow and reduce congestion.

  It’s fair enough to point out that too rigid enforcement doesn’t put anyone at risk but the story feeds into the general problem that, as the draft of the third Road Investment Strategy put it:

  National Highways should not be over-reliant on technology, for example drawing on insights from the use of cameras and stopped vehicle detection when considering driver safety and welfare.

  This is code for saying that the technology on smart motorways isn’t up to the job.

  

  (more…)

  2025.12.16

• DfT adds insult to death and injury on smart motorways

  There’s a good write-up in the (Sheffield) Star of the current situation over the release of the 14 evaluation reports on smart motorways that ministers are sitting on, with the Department for Transport’s (DfT) excuses not fooling anyone.

  It features Claire Mercer’s reaction to the DfT being unable to say that there is anything other than a  made-up “assurance” process to justify the ongoing suppression of the Post Opening Project Evaluations (POPEs).

  The reality, as National Highways told me, is that ministers have to agree a “comms handling plan” before telling us how (un)safe the projects are.

  

  Speaking to The Star, Claire – founder of the Smart Motorways Kill Campaign – scolded the DfT and said she believes the “only reason” for the delays can be that roads minister Simon Lightwood is “merely preparing to spin what are likely to be very negative findings.”

  The Star does include Mercer’s allegation that Lightwood lied to her by falsely claiming that an assurance process is “ongoing”:

  (more…)

  2025.12.15

• Look over there, Greenwood says as active travel funding falls

  With Labour cutting funding for active travel and being coy about whether its forthcoming cycling and walking investment strategy (CWIS3) will include meaningful targets, transport minister Lilian Greenwood has gone in for the diversionary tactic of reheating the culture wars.

  On Sunday The Guardian reported pressure from campaigners for CWIS3 to include targets beyond the feeble – and clearly unmeasurable – aspiration to make walking, wheeling and cycling “easy, safe, and accessible for everyone” by 2035.

  

  On Wednesday, Greenwood answered – or rather failed to answer – a question from shadow transport secretary Richard Holden on:

  (more…)

  2025.12.12

• Minister fibs to keep smart motorway failings secret

  Roads minister Simon Lightwood has admitted that no genuine assurance process is taking place that would justify his cover-up of National Highways’ evaluations of smart motorways.

  

  He has responded (sort of) to another question from fellow Labour MP Sarah Champion about the 14 Post Opening Project Evaluation (POPE) reports on smart motorways that the Department for Transport (DfT) is suppressing.

  Judging from Lightwood’s determination to hide these reports until he works out how to spin them, you might imagine that they show that the safety, economic benefits and environmental impact of individual schemes are not great

  Asked:

  what the assurance processes are under which the Post Opening Project Evaluation (POPE) of Major Schemes are conducted

  Lightwood replied:

  National Highways follows its established “Analytical Assurance Framework” for assuring POPE reports, which includes fourth line independent external expert analytical assurance from DfT.

  As these are complex reports it is right that my officials take the time to provide summary advice of these reports in the round and undertake wider assurance to advise me on the quality of collective findings.

  The first part appears to be untrue as National Highways does not have an analytical assurance framework that is separate from the DfT’s framework, but this is probably irrelevant as Lightwood is no longer claiming that this is still happening.

  Instead he has made up a completely new process under which his officials supposedly group together a whole bunch of POPE reports to summarise them and carry out a fictional “wider evaluation”. Implicitly, he is admitting that no formal assurance process is being carried out.

  To be fair, he is not actually saying either that an informal “wider assurance” process is happening, just that it is right that it should happen.

  Of course, the point about such a process is that concern for the “quality of collective findings” does not mean that the individual reports need any further assurance before they can be released.

  We are back to the reality – that ministers are working out to spin – or bury – the bad news.

  2025.12.08

• DfT working out how to spin bad news on smart motorway safety

  Update: National Highways has told me that the DfT is sitting on a total of 14 reports. Of these, nine are five years after and five are one year after.

  National Highways has said it will publish the reports on smart motorway performance that the Department for Transport (DfT) has been suppressing for nearly three years once ministers have decided how to spin the “complicated” data.

  As I have reported, ministers called in the Post Opening Project Evaluation (POPE) reports, at least nine of which were due to be completed by National Highways in 2022, and have not allowed the government-owned company so publish them, supposedly while it carries out “assurance”.

  

  The reports could show that individual smart motorway schemes are failing on issues such as safety, the environment and their impact on the economy.

  I asked both National Highways and the DfT to disclose the reports under the Freedom of Information Act but the company has refused under section 22 (1), claiming that it had agreed “a clear route” to publication with the DfT.

  Among other “public interest” reasons for withholding the data it said:

  We have agreed an approximate date for release by DfT pre Christmas 2025 (subject to DfT agreeing the comms handling plan.

  Publication will take place once other specified actions have taken place including briefing of ministers, agreement on a comms plan and final quality assurance.

  It explained that the POPE are “complicated” and that it is in the public interest “that the communication of the results is led by the DfT”.

  Significantly, National Highways added that the safety sections “include further analysis of data that is already in the public domain, and which has been reported on by NH in its annual stocktake and safety reports”.

  Unable to resist spinning the findings even in a supposedly objective balancing exercise, National Highways added:

  The POPE reports support the conclusion already drawn that Smart Motorways are amongst the country’s safest roads.

  This is clearly the DfT’s concern – National Highways can amalgamate data to disguise the fact that individual schemes are less safe than they want to admit but POPE reports are at a scheme level.

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  2025.11.25

• Greenwood and Alexander mangle their messages on safety strategy

  Road safety minister Lilian Greenwood appears to want the credit for delivering “the first road safety strategy in a decade”, without actually delivering it – and is causing confusion along the way.

  I joked recently that the boast would soon be extended to 11 years as the Department for Transport fails to produce the strategy.

  Now Greenwood has resorted to saying “over a decade”, as in this recent Instagram post, where she is pictured with transport secretary Heid Alexander, proclaiming “safer roads ahead”.

  

  How much safer? and how far ahead? remain the questions and a the lack of a timetable led to a bit of backtracking on LinkedIn from Jamie Hassall, executive director at the Parliamentary Advisory Council for Transport Safety (PACTS).

  After originally commenting “What great news!”, he admitted: “I should have used a ? rather than a ! I thought this might be the release of the strategy.”

  Anyone looking at this can be forgiven for thinking that the hype from ministers might signal that the strategy is imminent, and indeed it may be.

  If the plan will indeed save lives, the delay is costing them.

  Meanwhile, Greenwood has returned to saying “this year” after going back to the “in due course” formulation.

  In a response this week to a parliamentary question, she wrote:

  Our Road Safety Strategy is under development and will include a broad range of policies. We intend to publish by the end of the year.

  If (still) under development is true, it isn’t imminent.

  What’s that saying about the road to hell?

  2025.11.20

• DfT backs away from Road Safety Strategy “this year”

  The Department for Transport (DfT) has confirmed that it is no longer pledging to publish its new Road Safety Strategy this year, despite a very recent pledge from a minister.

  I noticed that in a written parliamentary answer on 27 October, Lilian Greenwood said:

  Our Road Safety Strategy is under development and will include a broad range of policies. We intend to publish by the end of the year.

  But in (multiple) subsequent answers, such as this one just a few days later, she has only said e.g.

  We will set out more details in due course.

  

  I asked the DfT if it still intends to publish the road safety strategy by the end of the year and a spokesperson told me that “in due course” – i.e. no public target date – is its current line.

  It should be a great embarrassment for ministers. In August “government sources” briefed the Times that the strategy is “due to be published in the autumn”, as well as spinning quite a lot of what might be in it.

  I don’t think transport secretary Heidi Alexander was asked about the timing of the document when appearing before the Transport Committee yesterday, although she did mention that it was on its way.

  Ministers are fond of saying that the new strategy will be “the first for 10 years”.

  At this rate their achievement will be even better, perhaps the first for 11 years.

  2025.11.13