It’s not often that the nation looks to Wales for lessons in reactive government — Labour’s record there has been startlingly bad — but on one crucial issue perhaps it should. Wales, like London, introduced a 20mph speed limit across much of the country in September. The Welsh responded with the eloquence characteristic of that nation that it was a really awful idea: 470,000 people signed a petition against it.
So back in April the First Minister carried out that well-known motoring manoeuvre, the U-turn. The 20mph proposals are being largely reversed, chiefly on those roads which aren’t much used by pedestrians anyway.
