A woman who has campaigned against Smart Motorways following the death of her husband says that “only half the battle has been won”.
A woman who has campaigned against Smart Motorways following the death of her husband says that “only half the battle has been won”.
Claire Mercer of the Smart Motorways Kill campaign appeared on GB News in the wake of a Government U-turn on building any more of the roads.
She told TV host Nana Akua on GB News: “It’s a bit of a win, but it’s only half the battle and it’s still important for the battle to go on because it’s the current ones that are killing us.”
Claire recalled how her partner Jason had a minor collision on the M1 in Sheffield and how both the drivers “should have been on their way within a few minutes”. But because there was a sign that said no hard shoulder for four miles, this wasn’t the case.
She said: “They got out of their vehicles, and they spoke to each other there and an HGV crashed into them and caused absolute carnage across four lanes of the motorway. And even when there was absolute carnage across four lanes of the motorway, the technology that we’re led to believe will save our lives didn’t pick them up even then.
“The campaign doesn’t stop here because it’s the existing ones that are killing us. So unfortunately, we’ve still got a job to do and we’re not going to stop until we’ve got the hard shoulder back on every single motorway.
“All the way through there are weak links, the technology is not up for the job. There is nowhere near enough staff employed in the control centres. During inquest after inquest that I’ve sat through, National Highways have said we’ve got 100% camera coverage on the motorways, but when pressed they eventually admit although they’ve got 100% camera coverage, there are not enough camera operators employed to watch them. So, the cameras are looking but there’s no one watching, and this is the same everywhere.
“So, you’ve just got weak link after weak link after weak link and the technology that’s meant to be installed in the road is either not installed as in my husband’s case or it didn’t work. It’s just not picking it up.
“People’s lives are dependent on this and the other argument that a lot of these accidents are down to human error. We’re human. You can’t take the human out of this. We are human and we had an invaluable thing at the side of the road that didn’t rely on glitchy technology, it didn’t rely on humans, and it worked, and we chose to take it away.”