GRAHAM Carter asks that the nonsense being written about speed and safety is stopped, however his views and support for the Lancashire Partnership for Road Safety are both flawed and subject to considerable debate.

Yes, speed has a direct consequence on the severity of any accident but to address the consequence rather than the cause fails all road users.

Some 90 per cent of all accidents are not speed related and of the remainder speed is only a factor in 20 per cent, leaving 70 per cent of casualties resulting from the principal cause, driver error.

As one of the main causes of driver error is distraction/inattention it is hardly nonsense to suggest that the continual monitoring of a speedometer is likely to lead to more casualties, a fact borne out by the failure of the saturation camera regime to have any impact on national casualty rates.

A safe driver will often anticipate and avoid an accident by the continual monitoring of the factors that have a real bearing on road safety such as road conditions and the actions of other road users and any distraction, be it the continued curse of hand-held mobile phones or the requirement to avoid exceeding the speed limit by even one mph (as Mr Carter advocates), can only lead to more accidents.

I have, as regular readers will know, opposed speed cameras since the "cash for cameras" regime was introduced as it was clear then that road safety decisions would be made by people with vested interests as fines pay their wages, a prophecy that has unfortunately exceeded my wildest nightmares.

Being on a road safety panel, Mr Carter should be aware that there are many more efficient ways to improve road safety - including the regulation of speed - but as these do not produce the revenue required to staff partnerships they are and will continue to be overlooked.

A final word on the latest con unveiled by the government this week of graded penalties.

The chief of Lancashire Police who is well aware of the wedge being driven between his force and the public but the current obsession with speed cameras had advocated a regulated system of his own whereby fines and penalty points were graded according to excess speed but with the important factor of an allowance before penalties began.

This was actually pretty much in line with the policy espoused by the Partnership but with a slightly higher allowance and while the hypocrisy which fuels the current spate of cameras continues it was at least a commonsense step.

There is no allowance in the latest proposal meeting that 1mph over the limit gets you a penalty (reduced though it may be) meaning a measure being lauded as tempering of the camera regime will actually incriminate more drivers.

Road safety cannot be served by the current fixation on speed born out of the vested interests of the Partnerships and until a balanced approach is adopted we will all continue to suffer.

STEPHEN SADLER, Valley Drive, Padiham.