SUGGESTIONS that money raised by speed cameras is not in fact spent on roads or road safety have been around for quite a while.

It has long been suspected that the cash went straight into the coffers of the Treasury.

And as the amount coming in has risen so, we suspect, has the temptation to site more and more cameras where they will catch the most motorists and therefore raise the most revenue for the government.

In Lancashire alone the amount collected from offending motorists as a result of speed cameras is so enormous that a surplus of at least £2.6million a year goes direct to the Treasury.

The estimated income in the county this year alone is £7.2million.

Now Hyndburn MP Greg Pope is angry after discovering that money he thought was being recycled into maintaining cameras and other safety measures is in effect being treated as a tax on motorists.

And he is calling for the cash - which is a significant amount since with 320 we have one of the country's biggest concentrations of cameras - to be kept in the county so that it can be used by Lancashire police to fight more conventional crime like burglaries.

He's right. The money should be used in the area where it was raised.