AN MP has called on the Government to take action to stem the rising death toll on roads worldwide.

The move from Rossendale and Darwen MP Janet Anderson comes after reports that global road deaths will double within 10 years, to two million a year, unless urgent action is taken now.

Currently 3,000 people are killed on roads every day, the majority in developing countries, making road accidents a global killer on the scale of Malaria and TB.

Now Mrs Anderson has signed a House of Commons motion appealing for the Government to make road safety an international development priority.

The Early Day Motion includes a campaign to provide better engineering measures and wider community-based road safety initiatives such as increasing the use of seat belts, child restraints and motorcycle helmets in developing countries.

It also seeks to prevent speeding and drink-driving.

The MP said: "I feel it is important to support this because a child is killed in a road accident every three minutes. In the UK road crashes are still the biggest killer of teenagers."

The Make Roads Safe campaign has launched an online petition at www.makeroadssafe.org to encourage people to support international action to reduce deaths.

Grace Dawson, a spokeswoman for the Make Roads Safe campaign said: "We need to raise awareness.

"The Make Roads Safe campaign is very grateful for the support of Janet Anderson."