Road Safety and Active Travel to School

Debate between Lisa Smart and Paul Kohler

Tuesday 22nd April 2025 Westminster Hall

[Mr Paul Kohler (Wimbledon) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mrs Hobhouse. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Didcot and Wantage (Olly Glover) on securing the debate. His opening speech was thoughtful, and the speeches of so many Members from across the House were heartfelt and often heart-rending.

As Members from across the House have made clear, children across the country should feel safe when attending school, and parents, teachers and children should feel confident in cycling or walking to school. In many cases, however, that is very difficult. We know that walking and cycling to school brings huge benefits to children’s health—both physical and mental—and to the environment and the wider community, yet fewer children are doing it. As my hon. Friend the Member for Didcot and Wantage made clear, in 1975 around two thirds of children walked or cycled to school, but today that figure is under 50%, with just 3% cycling.

The decline is not inevitable. In fact, many studies have shown that schools, parents and children themselves would like the ability to walk or cycle to school, but many barriers remain. Road safety around schools remains a key issue. Last year, 64 children under 16 were killed on our roads and more than 12,000 were injured—34 every single day.

It is concerning that the danger is greatest in the places where children should be the safest: near their schools. I have sadly seen the tragic consequences of that in my constituency. In July 2023, there was a tragic road incident at The Study school in Wimbledon, which took the lives of two beautiful young children. The matter is still under investigation by the police, so I will be circumspect in my comments. Suffice it to say that when I met school staff recently, they made it clear that further steps must be taken to improve road safety around the school to prevent such an incident from happening again. Many schools, especially in rural areas, sit on or near roads with 40 mph or even 50 mph speed limits. That is simply unacceptable.

We know that children are more at risk between 3 pm and 6 pm, on their way home from school, and yet Government action remains piecemeal, reactive and underfunded. The UK once led the world in cutting road deaths. Bold steps such as drink-driving laws, seatbelt rules, safer infrastructure and education campaigns massively reduced incidents in Great Britain, but we are falling behind. Countries across Europe have made active travel safer and more accessible, while our progress has stalled. The Liberal Democrats are consequently calling on the Government to publish the long-overdue road safety strategy without delay.

[Lisa Smart (Hazel Grove) (LD)]

I add my voice to my hon. Friend’s call for the Government to get on with updating the road safety strategy. At the moment, they are suggesting that local communities must wait for three serious accidents or deaths for a fixed speed camera to be installed. Does he agree that we should shift the thinking, look at fixed speed cameras more as a preventive than a punitive tool, and update the guidance accordingly?

[Mr Kohler]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right that we must be proactive, and not reactive to death. We must anticipate accidents and do something before they happen.

The strategy must prioritise children and active travel, and draw lessons from past successes, including the road safety plan of the year 2000, which had a transformative impact and helped halve fatalities in just a decade. The lack of specific active travel infrastructure is linked to that. We must continue to improve the provision of safe cycling and walking routes across our communities. We must improve parents’ and schools’ confidence in children using active travel to get to school.

Research from Cycling UK shows that the appetite is there. In rural areas such as Devon, 84% of people support more walking and cycling, but more than 80% feel that their local roads are unsafe. When the Department for Transport asked families what would help children walk to school, the most common answers were safer roads and safe crossing points. Improving the provision of designated routes, safer crossings and better lighting is vital to improving active travel.

The Government must also properly invest in cycling and walking infrastructure, and put a new comprehensive active travel strategy in place. Their increase in funding for active travel is welcome, but they must ensure that the money is spent effectively and targeted at where it is needed.

Stations: Step-free Access

Debate between Lisa Smart and Paul Kohler

Tuesday 18th March 2025 Westminster Hall

[Lisa Smart (Hazel Grove) (LD)]

My hon. Friend is laying out the case very clearly for more certainty about the future of Access for All funding, and the real, crying need for many of our communities to have level access to public transport. Does he agree that stations such as Bredbury in my constituency, where a passenger can travel in one direction with level access but not in the other, are affecting people’s decisions about whether to take employment—making this a growth issue for our country, not just a fairness issue?

[Mr Kohler]

My hon. Friend has also shown how prescient she is, because I am about to reach that point in my conclusion. It is clear that the Government need to take urgent action on all this. There is a desperate need to get our economy growing, and ensuring that our infrastructure is accessible should play a key part in that. We hear today that the Government are reviewing the benefits system to get more people back to work. Surely they see that making public transport accessible is a crucial part of that endeavour. Accessibility is not just a good-to-have; it is vital to creating a more inclusive and productive country. I hope the Government are listening.