MP: Lorries should have safety mirrors

Emily Thornberry wants the Government and the Olympic Delivery Authority to award building contracts only to firms which use HGVs fitted with the wide-angle mirrors.

Her call, being made in the BBC's Inside Out London programme tonight, follows the deaths of a number of cyclists killed by lorries turning left because the drivers failed to see them. The issue has been highlighted by the Standard's Safer Cycling campaign.

Under EU regulations, all new lorries should have the mirrors by March 2009, but the MP believes the rule should be brought in now and applied to older vehicles too.

Road safety minister Jim Fitzpatrick has said it is impossible to implement the changes early.

Ms Thornberry, Labour MP for Islington South and Finsbury Park, chairs the parliamentary cycling group. She said: "We have this ridiculous situation where vehicles cannot see cyclists and pedestrians. It is horrifically dangerous, a major cause of deaths."

The programme also talks to Reg Wright, the husband of jewellery designer Emma Foa, who died in December last year as she cycled from her home in Hampstead Heath to Clerkenwell.

Ms Foa, 56, was crushed between roadside railings and a cement mixer's rear wheels as it turned left in King's Cross. Driver Michael Thorn, 52, of Headley Down, Surrey, was fined £300 after admitting careless driving.

Mr Wright said: "Emma's death and the increasing number of deaths of female cyclists by construction vehicles were and are preventable.

"With London's building boom, and the boom that will result from redevelopment for the Olympics, such deaths will multiply exponentially if safety standards are not improved."

More than 1,600 cyclists have signed the London Cycling Campaign's petition calling for the mirrors to be fitted to all lorries.

Inside Out London will be shown on BBC1 at 7.30pm.