WHO would not agree that every home should have a reliable smoke alarm, with larger properties - care homes, commercial and industrial properties - having sprinkler systems also?

All of them for the purpose of identifying and dealing with a potentially lethal situation.

Why then is this high degree of life-saving consideration and effort being denied for our roads, where ten people are killed every day, with scores seriously injured? Aren't what the responsible members of society know as safety cameras, and what speed freaks know as speed traps, a form of smoke alarm?

Have these life-saving devices - with the AA having published an atlas identifying their whereabouts - been made virtually redundant? We also have Snoopers - dashboard speed trap detectors - doing the same job. What might happen if the batteries were taken out of every smoke alarm and who might do such a thing?

Some people get a buzz out of driving at excessive speed. The problem with fire-bugs and speed freaks - and a problem for everyone - is that they are blind to the possibility of harming others, family and friends, even themselves. What is more, they dont really care.

ALLAN RAMSAY

RoadPeace