We might be no safer but the safety camera partnerships are no poorer,

Mind how you go!

I did mean (perhaps sarcastically) do dark conditions make us safer from being nicked? I was wondering if some speed cameras need daylight to work correctly. When you see the flash during the day it looks bright but I still doubt (having studied photography way back) if that light is bright enough to take a focussed shot of a moving car's number plate without any ambient daylight. And the camera vans don't have any lighting at all.

Three points: collisions are more likely when there is a conflict of speed or direction between vehicles. If more people keep closer to the speed limit, collisions are less likely.

And kinetic energy is proportional to the square of the speed. So 90mph is about 1.6 times as much K.E. to dissipate in a collision that 70mph - so in turn collisions are less energetic and less likely to kill.

The gantry speed limit signs are probably easier to see in the dark, so the "I never knew it was set to 50mph" excuse is less likely to be valid in winter.

Have speed cameras made a difference:-

I remember the 1980's - speeds were much higher, frequent outside lane speeds of 90mph .

You'd get the odd car that was going fast, but the gaps between drivers were better. I think the standard of driving has gone down, people don't know how to make smooth progress now, no anticipation with the result that they use more fuel than necessary, terrible tailgating and sudden lane changes and cutting up. I'm basing some of this on the A12 which is a road populated by m****s.

Too populated now to be a pleasure.

Driving has evolved, better roads, more traffic calming also more powerful cars in an environment of more traffic, improved training and lower speed limits (eg 20mph zones) so it's difficult to compare, but what is certain is that without the rigid enforcement that does exist traffic speeds would be faster ... which takes us back in a loop to the original question, are we safer now? Probably

Depends how you define 'safer'. Fatalities and serious injury rates may be lower, but this is probably mostly due to seatbelts, airbags, crumple zones etc.

The incidence of collisions, however, is probably higher; the general standard of driving is really very poor. On a daily basis one sees tailgating, phone use, inconsiderate and illegal parking, traffic light jumping (even when there are cameras!).

Improved training? Only today I saw a car stopped on double yellow lines for a good ten minutes, (there were also yellow 'no loading' lines on the pavement), a young-ish lad sitting in the driving seat waiting for someone, obviously thought as he'd put hazard flashers on this was perfectly OK.

Theory test can be swotted up and once passed it is often forgotten (like O level Latin

When I started driving, cars were less crashworthy, we knew it was likely to hurt if you ran into something, today many seem to feel invulnerable (especially drivers of 4x4s) so are less careful.