Wales’s 20mph speed limit has cut road deaths. Why is there still even a debate?

‘There is still this idea that 70 or so road deaths a year in Wales is acceptable. But we would never accept 70 deaths a year on the ferry to Ireland, or on buses.’ Photograph: Dimitris Legakis/Athena Pictures

Even with the caveats about limited data and untangling causation and correlation, the statistics are striking: the first year of a scheme in Wales where the speed limit on urban roads was lowered to 20mph resulted in about 100 fewer people killed or seriously injured.

Introduced in September 2023 as a major road safety project of the Labour-run Welsh government, it made 20mph the default limit for any built-up area, defined as roads where lamp-posts were no more than about 180 metres apart. This took in about a third of all roads, with the Conservative opposition saying the definition was far too broad.