Roundabout ways to break the law

Ok, someone made a silly mistake (‘Amazement as car goes wrong way on roundabout’, July 11).

The police do not intend to follow it up. Fine.

Using your mobile phone whilst driving, even if stationary, to film it; that IS illegal. Alan Foxon Ashford

Over the years, I have learned that it needs more than a complaint to the council to get serious failings put right.

When a visiting German driver collided with a motorcycle on the William Harvey roundabout, his excuse was that he had been confused by incorrect road number signs. He was right, the numbers were wrong. It took more than seven years of intense lobbying, two articles by the Express, input by ITV Meridian and BBC South East Today to get most of them put right.

Without the media’s help, confusion would still remain.

Ashford council claimed that Ashford had a specific problem, that because of its location near to Dover, a lot of foreign drivers passed this way; surely, all the more reason to get signs right.

By some miracle, we were able to get our request for an underpass under the M20 for cyclists and pedestrians answered, but it was not until some seven years later, after continuous lobbying and help from the Express and the BBC, that the underpass was opened (and is now well used).

It seems to me that it is often left to amateurs to get thing put right which should have been sorted by highly paid council officers.

I hope that my complaining may have contributed towards making Ashford a slightly better place for all. Ted Prangnell Kennington