It is perhaps hardly a surprise in the light of the spread of special interest groups to discover there is one called The Road Safety Marking Association. It is even less of a surprise to learn that the outfit believes there are insufficient road markings. In fact, I think they are probably right.

The association’s director George Lee told the Daily Telegraph: “Two years ago, just two per cent of our major road network had markings that rated virtually non-existent. Now nearly a tenth of the centre lines on our trade routes [?] are dangerously worn.”

Now it may be that advice to drivers to stick to the left ought to be enough to prevent head-on crashes. But if this were so, why would we bother painting centre lines at all?

The situation seems to me typical of a department of government — I refer to Transport — that pays lip service to safety but in practice lets things slip.

As an example, who has permitted, each night in recent weeks, the huge floodlights on the A34 near Wytham in connection with work in a lay-by? They supply dangerous dazzle — much worse than a car’s main beams — for the drivers of all vehicles approaching from the north.