Motorway Speed Limits: Enforcement (Hansard, 21 June 1990)

The Minister of State, Home Office (Earl Ferrers)
My Lords, the responsibility for enforcing speed limits rests with individual chief officers of police. The enforcement of any particular law is for them to determine in the light of other police commitments.

§ Viscount Head
My Lords, is the noble Earl aware that the speed limits on motorways are held in utter contempt today? Will the Government consider urgent legislation to reduce those speeds and make the motorways safer places?

Earl Ferrers
My Lords, I am fully aware that a great number of people exceed the speed limits on motorways, and no doubt noble Lords make a contribution. It is for chief police officers to decide how to deploy their forces. The motorways of the 1043 United Kingdom carry 15 per cent. of the traffic, but only 2 per cent. of all accidents occur on motorways. In international comparisons, the United Kingdom motorways are among the safest.

§ Lord Mishcon
My Lords, does the noble Earl agree that the chief difficulty regarding speed on motorways lies with contraflows, with the lethal M.25 and with repair works? I recognise what he says and appreciate the fact that the police force must decide for itself on the best use of manpower. However, cannot cameras be used on the motorways with much more effect in order to ascertain speed? Would it not also be useful for those cameras to be advertised so that they are a deterrent as well as a source for conviction?

Earl Ferrers
My Lords, for a moment I thought that my powers of hearing were going. I thought the noble Lord was suggesting that we use candles. I then thought he was referring to camels! I then realised that the word was "cameras".
The noble Lord is perfectly correct: there is a possibility of using such weapons. The White Paper The Road User and the Law published on 7th February set out the Government's proposals to allow the use of automatic detection devices for speeding and traffic offences, and legislation to implement those will be introduced when the parliamentary timetable permits.

§ Viscount Mountgarret
My Lord, does my noble friend agree that one of the ways in which he could meet the point in the noble Viscount's Question is to consider setting the speed limit at a slightly more realistic level in these days of much improved roads and much safer and improved motor cars? Many people —I have to admit that I am one—find excessive difficulty in maintaining the statutory speed limit of 70 miles per hour. A slightly more realistic level might contribute towards solving this difficulty and might be respected by more people.

Earl Ferrers
My Lords, I am glad that my noble friend admits to his failings in obeying the speed limits. However, it is a point that is constantly produced. The 70 miles per hour speed limit strikes a balance between fast, convenient travel and safety. The average motorways speeds, according to the national speed survey of 1987, were 65 mph for cars, 59 mph for buses and coaches and 54 mph for lorries. My noble friend may be surprised at those figures but apparently they are correct.

§ Lady Saltoun of Abernethy
My Lords, the noble Earl stated that only 2 per cent. of accidents occur on motorways. Can he tell the House what percentage of our roads have motorway status?

Earl Ferrers
No, my Lords, I cannot.

§ Lord Mowbray and Stourton
My Lords, my noble friend said that action is up to the chief constables of the local areas concerned. I completely understand that. However, I ask myself, and perhaps I may ask him, why the local chief constables and the local 1044 police authorities cannot correct the signs which are put up to indicate local building works. One sees notices of hazards one mile ahead, or which indicate that there is a 50 mph speed limit in operation or perhaps a speed restriction of 30 mph. But as one drives along there is no evidence of anything happening and the signs eventually peter out. Does the Minister consider that that is a direct inducement for people to get fed up with obeying instructions which on the face of it have importance and to which they would pay much more attention if they were told why they were there?

Earl Ferrers
My Lords, perhaps I may answer my noble friend by saying that that is a question which I ask myself. I agree with him.

§ Lord Jenkins of Putney
My Lords, is the noble Earl aware that in the United States a speed limit of 55 mph is in force on all turnpike roads and that it is enforced without difficulty by the employment of a special traffic corps of policemen, many of whom ride motor cycles? Is it not the case that the law in this country will not be enforced in that area until we do the same?

Earl Ferrers
My Lords, I do not think that in fact that is so. About 8 per cent. of our police force is engaged specifically on traffic work. A number of other officers become involved in traffic work in the course of carrying out their responsibilities. In 1987 35 states in the United States decided to raise the speed limits on rural interstate highways from 55 mph to 65 mph, with the result that road deaths increased by 16 per cent.

§ Lord Stoddart of Swindon
My Lords, despite the figures that the Minister has just given for speed limits, does he agree that virtually everyone knows that some of the worst offenders are heavy lorries which belt along the motorways, even in wet weather such as we have today, at 70 mph, 75 mph and sometimes even 80 mph? Does he further agree that those lorries constitute an increasing hazard to ordinary motorists? Will the Government reconsider their attitude and insist on legislation to introduce speed limiters in order to keep lorries down to the permitted speed of 60 mph on motorways?

Earl Ferrers
My Lords, if we were to produce legislation to ensure that lorries kept to the correct speed, we should have to ensure that motor cars did so as well. As I explained, it is a matter of enforcement. Police officers have to carry out enforcement as best they can. However, I agree with the noble Lord that it is a great hazard when one finds oneself behind a lorry, as he puts it, belting along the motorway at 80 mph with water flying all over the place.

§ Lord Stoddart of Swindon
My Lords, I believe that I spoke of speed limiters. I am not sure whether the Minister understood exactly what I meant. I was referring to fitting speed governors in the same way as we have on coaches.

Earl Ferrers
My Lords, if the noble Lord is referring to a mechanical device which prevents equipment from going faster than it should do, that is an idea which I shall consider.

§ Lord Molloy
My Lords, does the Minister agree that those who use the motorways a great deal are aware of one remarkable situation? One is aware that speeds are being excessively abused; suddenly a police car appears and every vehicle slows down. Would it not be possible for the Government to inquire of a cross-section of chief constables whose areas include the great motorways whether it would be of any help to have more police vehicles on the road, as their presence acts as a deterrent to anyone intending to break the law?

Earl Ferrers
My Lords, I agree with the noble Lord. That is why chief constables and police authorities are always coming to me asking for more men to deal with road traffic offences and every other kind of criminal activity. I agree with him that the presence of a police vehicle makes a great deal of difference. However, I give him one warning: some police forces operate vehicles which are not evidently police cars and the noble Lord may get caught out one day!

§ Lord Clinton-Davis
My Lords, does the noble Earl agree that the majority of member states of the European Community apply a substantially lower speed limit to heavy goods vehicles and coaches than we apply in this country? Is he aware that in fact there is a proposal on the table of transport Ministers which envisages just such an approach? What is the Government's current attitude to that proposal, which apparently would receive the support of no less a person than my noble friend Lord Stoddart, who is not normally an advocate of European legislation?

Earl Ferrers
My Lords, it does not surprise me that such support comes from the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, but views to the contrary might come from many vehicle owners and operators. Certainly the matter will be considered.

§ Lord Jenkins of Hillhead
My Lords, I should like to follow up the question of the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart. I do not agree with him on all issues but I do on this one. What would be the noble Earl's advice. to a motorist proceeding at approximately 70 mph in the outer lane when overtaken in the middle lane by a great lorry thundering along at nearly 80 mph and throwing up a great spray? Should that motorist go to 85 mph to overtake the lorry or not?

Earl Ferrers
My Lords, it is interesting to hear the noble Lord in agreement with the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart. That event will have to go down in one of the annals of history. The answer to his question is that the motorist in the right-hand lane doing 70 mph ought to have been in the left-hand lane in order to allow others to overtake him should they wish to break the Law.

§ Lord Mishcon
My Lords, does the Minister wish to have that remark go on record in Hansard without any proviso at all?

Earl Ferrers
The proviso, my Lords, is that anyone who is driving along a motorway is obliged to use the inside lane primarily, the middle lane for overtaking and the third lane for overtaking after that. Drivers are not permitted under the law to hog the outside lane.

§ Lord Molloy
My Lords, from what the noble Earl said I was under the impression that we should make a contribution and move over to allow those who want to break the law in this island to do so. Did he really mean that?

Earl Ferrers
My Lords, the noble Lord knows perfectly well that the regulations and motorway practice require one to use the inside lane other than when one desires to overtake. It is no defence to drive in the outside lane without any intention of moving over to the inside lane.

§ Lord Hatch of Lusby
My Lords, did I hear correctly that the noble Earl mentioned the raising of speed limits in certain states in the United States and accompanied his remarks with the information that following the raising of speed limits the number of accidents also increased? If so, is that not an answer to those who would like to raise the speed limits in this country? Does he agree that it is an indication that we should lower the speed limit on motorways in this country both for safety and for more efficient use of petrol?

Earl Ferrers
My Lords, I was trying to explain to the House, if the experience of the United States was anything to go by, that when they raised the speed limit from 55 mph to 65 mph, the number of accidents increased by 16 per cent. If that experience were repeated on motorways in Britain, 42 more people would be killed. That is why we think it appropriate to keep the level as it is. The noble Lord would like to lower the limit. I presume that if we lowered it to 10 mph very few people would be killed.

§ The Lord Privy Seal (Lord Belstead)
My Lords, there are two more Questions to come. I know that it may not seem very equitable, but perhaps I may suggest that the noble Viscount, who has been trying to speak for some while, asks one more supplementary question and then we move on to the next one.

§ Viscount Head
My Lords, it is a well known and understood fact that an increase in speed increases the risk of an accident. Presumably that is why we have speed limits. It is well known that heavy goods vehicles cause a lot of accidents. I understand that coaches will have mandatory governors fitted next year. Why cannot heavy goods vehicles have governors fitted also?

Earl Ferrers
My Lords, the question of whether governors are fitted to different kinds of vehicles 1047 falls outside the scope of this Question. If the noble Viscount wishes to ask a specific question on that matter, then I shall try to answer it.