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Road Safety Bill [HL]

My Lords, we have been around this particular motorway course before, in terms of speed limits—three times, I think, in the past 12 months. The arguments still hold. They hold even more strongly in some circumstances. The noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, referred to the American experience. The reason why American speed limits were so low at one time, she will remember, is that at that time they were, believe it or not, actually quite concerned about emissions and consumption of fuel. I know they have raised them more recently. I have to say that while she had one set of figures, I have another. In the states where speed limits have been raised to 75 miles per hour—and that is the highest level I know in the United States—there has been a 38 per cent rise in deaths per million vehicle miles. So I do not think her case is proven by the US, useful laboratory though that may be. One thing is clear, though: none of the states has an 80 mile-per-hour speed limit. As the noble Baroness said, we have introduced some variety to motorway speed limits on a section of the M25. The limit was lowered for safety reasons in adverse circumstances. It was never raised beyond 70. It dropped below 70 when either traffic conditions or weather conditions necessitated some gradation on a particularly difficult part of the M25, in all its wonderful uniqueness. With regard to the general issues, motorways are the safest roads we have in Britain, and the Government intend to keep them that way.