THE campaign for better road safety on the A4 in Wiltshire has been extended this week to include an accident blackspot near Marlborough.

This week Devizes MP Michael Ancram called for communities along the A4 through Wiltshire to get together to demand improvements.

He said many of the communities along the road, which winds through his constituency as well as that of North Wiltshire MP James Gray, have been experiencing similar problems.

Mr Ancram was speaking in support of a plea from villages along the A4 to the west of Marlborough where there has been a spate of serious accidents recently.

The most recent fatality involved the death of 21 year old motorcyclist Terry Brown from Devizes in June.

Mr Brown, whose family comes from Marlborough, died when his motorcycle was in collision with a car emerging from a junction at Fyfield.

Several fatal accidents have taken place in recent decades on the A4 past the Lower Fyfield and the upper Fyfield (Priest Acre) junctions.

There have also been fatalities in recent years at the two junctions onto the A4 from the village of West Overton, one by the Bell public house and the other opposite North Farm.

People living in the Kennet Valley Villages of Fyfield, West Overton, Lockeridge and West Kennett are increasingly concerned about the risks they face when they emerge on to the A4.

All these villages have suffered numerous serious accidents and fatalities and have started to agitate for road improvements to reduce the toll.

Coun Veronica Handover, a member of the Fyfield with West Overton Parish Council told the Gazette that Wiltshire County Council had ignored repeated requests for a speed limit along the A4 through Fyfield and past Lockeridge and West Overton.

The only speed restriction on the road is the national 60mph limit that villagers say is much too fast.

Coun Handover was fed up with the county council saying it would wait for Government policy on speeding to change before it would do something.

She said the requests from the Kennet Valley villages had been getting the same blank response as the pleas from other parts of the county along the A4.

She said: "We have been asking for a speed limit for two or three years since I have been on the parish council but the county council will not consider one."

Coun Handover said another suggestion was vibration strips on the road surface either side of the road junctions to warn drivers of hazards.

"The answer we get back from the county council is that there are not enough accidents to justify spending the money.

"We wonder how more accidents there will have to be before Wiltshire county council finally takes some action."

On Monday Mr Ancram said he would support any move to get the A4 given the same treatment as the A346/A338 Swindon-Salisbury Road.

Following eight fatalities in less than five years, the parish and town councils along the route got together with their two MPs, Mr Ancram and Salisbury MP Robert Key.

They have now secured funding for numerous minor improvements including lower speed limits, inter-active speed signs and better signing.