Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what assessment her Department has made of the adequacy of the safety of smart motorways.

Safety on our roads is of the upmost importance and that is why the Government is committed to delivering a new Road Safety Strategy. The last set of safety data published by National Highways shows that, overall, all three types of smart motorway are safer than conventional motorways for safety metrics such as deaths or serious injuries. However, the data also shows that the risk of a collision between a moving and a stopped vehicle is greater on smart motorways without a permanent hard shoulder than on other motorway types, with the risk of a serious injury or death due to a stopped vehicle collision lower on conventional and controlled motorways. National Highways has been taking action designed to reduce the risks associated with live lane stops, including but not limited to rolling out stopped vehicle detection (SVD) technology. We will continue to monitor safety on these roads.