Scottish high roads the riskiest in UK

SCOTLAND has the highest risk rating of all the UK's motorway and trunk road network, and as many as 10 per cent of Britain's motorways and A roads present an unacceptable danger to motorists.

According to the Road Safety Foundation, half of all crashes occur on just one tenth of Britain's road network, with Scottish roads the worst followed by north-west England, Yorkshire and the Humber and the East Midlands.

The report, which covers 28,000 miles of roads, also found that one third of all fatal and serious crashes occurred at junctions and that single carriageways were six times riskier to motorists than motorways and twice that of dual carriageways.

The West Midlands is the safest region, while the most dangerous road is the A537 between Macclesfield in Cheshire and Buxton in Derbyshire.

Road Safety Foundation director Dr Joanne Hill said: "As the road budget becomes tighter, emphasis must be on saving lives with less. It means prioritising treatment of the highest-risk routes most likely to benefit from low-cost, high-return countermeasures.

"This year's report shows that not only can Britain reduce roads deaths and serious injuries but that, by targeting a relatively small mileage of high-risk roads, we can do so with good economic returns."

She went on: "There are practical examples of how some authorities are slashing the toll of death and serious injury on high-risk stretches by as much as three-quarters.

"Simple, relatively inexpensive engineering measures, such as improvements to signing and lining, are paying dividends and are affordable, particularly when done as part of well-planned routine maintenance."