Speed Cameras: Installation Criteria

Debate between Lisa Smart and Lilian Greenwood

Tuesday 24th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Lilian Greenwood]

I agree with the hon. Member about the importance of community speed watch groups. I will come on to that topic a little later.

The guidance on the use of speed cameras and red light cameras should be used alongside setting local speed limits. These are tools to support our primary objective, which is reducing the number of collisions and casualties and, indeed, reducing their severity. I agree with the hon. Member for Hazel Grove that speed cameras work. In the right place, speed cameras can help manage safety risks by encouraging drivers to conform to the speed limit. However, they are not the only or always the best way to improve road safety. Speed limits should be evidence-led, and general compliance needs to be achievable without an excessive reliance on enforcement. Frankly, we cannot have a speed camera everywhere, and we cannot have a police officer everywhere.

As the hon. Member knows, the enforcement of road traffic law and the deployment of available police resources, including on mobile cameras, is the responsibility of individual chief constables and police and crime commissioners, taking into account specific local problems and the demands that they face. Local government is the main delivery body for road safety. Under section 39 of the Road Traffic Act 1988, local authorities have a statutory duty to take steps to reduce and prevent collisions, and they have the power to set speed limits on their roads. It is right that they focus on the areas of highest risk, which may be where tragic collisions have occurred, but there is nothing to stop them from implementing road safety measures elsewhere. Indeed, I would agree that a more proactive, preventive approach is entirely sensible. It is clearly incredibly valuable to identify places where there is a higher risk and evidence of near misses.

[Lisa Smart]

I am grateful for the Minister’s remarks. She says that it seems entirely sensible to move to a proactive approach; does she have plans to update the guidance in a way that moves towards that approach, so as to be clear with local authorities?

[Lilian Greenwood]

Certainly I welcome the opportunity for us to debate this issue today. I will reflect on the contributions that Members have made, and on the suggestions that the hon. Member has put forward. Local authorities already have the power to take that approach, and I want to be clear about that. It is a myth to say that they cannot act until there have been a number of fatalities; they already can. Local authorities also have a range of traffic management measures available to help improve safety in their areas. In addition to the ability to set local speed limits, they can also introduce traffic calming measures, speed-activated warning signs and average speed cameras.