East Sussex County Council has excelled itself with talk of a reduced speed limit of 50mph on our clogged-up main roads.

The largely motorway devoid road system of East Sussex is a shambles that has never been updated to cope with the huge increase in traffic. Local and central government have been happy to rake in all the extra tax revenue and give nothing back to the motorist.

It would take so little effort to safely speed things up by, for example, dualling the A259 between Little Common and Pevensey, on to the Polegate bypass and there are stretches of the A27 cart track from Polegate that could be widened before arriving at the multi million pound extravaganza straddling the railway at Beddingham.

All that does is show up the preceding miles all the way back to Polegate with the 40mph merchants clogging up an already appalling stretch of road.

No more of this rubbish about speed being the only factor behind accidents either.

There is some truly inept driving out there by people who never exceed the speed limit, people who don’t know how roundabouts and junctions work, people who are happy to delay everyone else behind them, peope who cause mayhem at 35-40 mph, people who hog the centre lane at 60mph and so on. All we see in countermeasures are speed cameras – lazy policing at its worst.

And don’t forget the desk jockeys who “de-dualled” the Flimwell dual carriageway while spending a bundle on ineffective measures at the crossroads at the same location that was always a bigger potential blackspot. You couldn’t make it up. Having caused much of the congestion, our byways people propose to add to it. What next – a countywide congestion charge?

Simon Stoddart The Ridge, Hastings