MOTORISTS will soon be able to judge whether the region's speed camera are being used as "cash cows" when a study is published next month.

Transport Secretary Alistair Darling said the research would compare the number of deaths and serious injuries before and after every camera in the country was installed.

Mr Darling said some speed traps were failing to make roads safer and would have to be taken out, although he did not say where they might be.

The study follows a Government announcement earlier this year that all cameras were put up in dangerous areas rather than put up to raise revenue.

Mr Darling has been forced to go a step further by publishing exhaustive details of each camera's impact on casualties on a particular road.

The use of speed cameras was pioneered in the North-East by Cleveland Police Force, which was chosen for a pilot scheme allowing revenue raised from the traps to be used to buy more equipment. The use of cameras has been extended to Northumbria and North Yorkshire.

The study will exclude Durham, the only force that has not set up a partnership with local authorities to install fixed speed traps.

Mr Darling told MPs: "People can see why the cameras were put there, and the difference before and after.

"There will be some sites where it will be necessary for me to say to the local safety partnerships, 'Go and ask yourselves whether these cameras ought to be there or whether they should be moved'. That is undoubtedly the case, but the vast majority of them do save lives."

The study is being carried out by Department for Transport staff. It will not reveal how much money each of the 5,000 cameras has raised.

In 2002/03, speed camera partnerships across England and Wales received £73m in fines, of which £7m went to the Treasury.

Earlier this week, the Police Federation warned that officers were being blamed by the public for cameras that were seen as money-makers, rather than safety measures.

The Government also announced plans for variable penalties for speeding motorists.