HUNDREDS of roadside cameras, smaller versions inside traffic lights and grannies with speed guns - now Lancashire is to get its own squad of mobile speed wardens.

The 12 Mobile Enforcement Technicians will hit the streets next month and will be responsible for carrying out speed enforcement throughout the county.

The move comes a week after it was announced that residents could be provided with speed guns to catch motorists breaking the limit in their villages.

Lancashire Road Safety Partnership -- which is made up of local councils, the health service and the police -- will also have 320 fixed speed camera sites by April and is also trialling cameras in traffic lights to catch green light speeders and red light jumpers.

Now the approach to road safety has been branded a 'one trick pony.'

The wardens will use existing police equipment and will start work in April. They will be paid around £16,000, about half the wage of a traffic police officer.

The is the first time using police trained civilians to carry out speed enforcement has been used in the North West.

Adrian Emberton, acting project manager for the Lancashire Partnership for Road Safety said: "We are going to put two mobile enforcement technicians into each division which will be more cost effective in relation to police time. We will be paying support staff through our budget rather than using money from our budget to pay police officers.

"We can be more effective in targeting areas where residents are saying they have a problem with speed. It will allow us to have somebody stood outside a school at 8am enforcing speed which, we would not usually be able to do

"It means we can get police officers back on the road not sat in the back of a van with a speed gun, which we have been criticised for. Our aim is to reduce casualties."

But Mark McArthur-Christie, of the Association of British Drivers, said: "It is a shame a complicated issue such as road safety can be reduced to a one trick pony - and that pony is speeding. What about dangerous driving, careless driving, poorly maintained vehicles, drink driving, drug driving, driving with poor vision or any of the other causes of accidents?"

Ribble Valley MP Nigel Evans said: "I am opposed to the willy nilly, blunderbus approach to putting cameras all over the place. I want to see a larger proportion of money generated by cameras spent not on more cameras, but on traffic calming measures."

Sixty six people were killed on the county's roads in 2002 but that figure rose to 88 last year, fuelling concerns that cameras were not working. But the number of accidents fell from 8,261 to 7,343 in the same period.

The wardens will use existing police equipment and will start work in April. They will be paid around £16,000, about half the wage of a traffic police officer.

The is the first time using police trained civilians to carry out speed enforcement has been used in the North West.

Adrian Emberton, acting project manager for the Lancashire Partnership for Road Safety said: "We are going to put two mobile enforcement technicians into each division which will be more cost effective in relation to police time. We will be paying support staff through our budget rather than using money from our budget to pay police officers.

"We can be more effective in targeting areas where residents are saying they have a problem with speed. It will allow us to have somebody stood outside a school at 8am enforcing speed which, we would not usually be able to do

"It means we can get police officers back on the road not sat in the back of a van with a speed gun, which we have been criticised for. Our aim is to reduce casualties."

But Mark McArthur-Christie, of the Association of British Drivers, said: "It is a shame a complicated issue such as road safety can be reduced to a one trick pony - and that pony is speeding. What about dangerous driving, careless driving, poorly maintained vehicles, drink driving, drug driving, driving with poor vision or any of the other causes of accidents?"

Ribble Valley MP Nigel Evans said: "I am opposed to the willy nilly, blunderbus approach to putting cameras all over the place. I want to see a larger proportion of money generated by cameras spent not on more cameras, but on traffic calming measures."

Sixty six people were killed on the county's roads in 2002 but that figure rose to 88 last year, fuelling concerns that cameras were not working. But the number of accidents fell from 8,261 to 7,343 in the same period.