Stockport’s Council’s Executive member for Education has welcomed the publication of the Road Safety Near Schools which updates upon School Safety improvements already undertaken by the Council – and details funding and further measures to protect the children of Stockport.
Published ahead of the Children and Young People scrutiny meeting of the 1st March, the report details the results of programmes such as ‘Operation Eagle Eye’, ‘Bikeability’ and the work of Traffic Services Road Safety team to raise awareness in schools and enforce responsible road use. Further to this, the report also details £150,000 in funding secured for the Bikeability road safety training programme over the next three years.
This comes on the back of the passage of the Council budget for 2017/18 last Thursday, in which £400,000 of further of capital investment was outlined for Road Safety investments by 2020/21. Outlined in a further report published by the council on the Transportation Capital Programme, investments of £200,000 next year will be followed by additional funding of £100,000 two following financial years.
There was also an amendment passed with cross-part support as part of the budget meeting which detailed an additional £0.066 million for road safety within the 2017/18 financial year.
Commenting, Executive Member for Education Cllr Dean Fitzpatrick said:
“The Labour Executive made a manifesto commitment to improve Road Safety around schools.
“The first hurdle to overcome toward this was to change the agenda and narrative from one of cuts to one of investing in this area.
“I am pleased to see we have done this, with cross-party support being given for further investment of in this area.
“The second challenge is to deliver on that promise. We have put together a comprehensive package which offers something for all the age ranges- from Operation Eagle Eye for the younger ones through to Bikeability and driver awareness programmes for teems and college-goers, and I am pleased the road safety report reflects positively upon this.
“The additional funding we have outlined in these reports and the budget will go a long way to help this delivery. This can only help build upon the difference we are already making, and I am proud of the lead we have taken.“