Council admits false claim over speed

Essex County Council has admitted making a false claim about the number of people killed as a result of speed. 

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The November issue of Essex Matters, the council’s magazine, claimed: “Eighty six people were killed on our roads last year, 36 of them because of speed.”

The council now admits the number of people killed in collisions in which speed was the “largest cause” was just 21.

Essex Matters editor Caroline Adlem said: “On further investigation the numbers printed in the Essex Matters magazine have been shown to have been in slight error.

This seems to have arisen from a misunderstanding over the way the figures are reported with the 36 accidents being where speed was a ‘factor’ in the accident rather than speed being the total cause.”