POLICE in the region joined a Europe-wide bid to cut road casualties yesterday.

Durham Constabulary made a road safety pledge on "European Day Without a Road Death".

The campaign, called Project Edward, has been launched by the European Traffic Police network after fatalities on the roads across the continent topped 25,000 last year.

Fire service, community speedwatch volunteers, Durham County Council and the police force joined forces to publicly make the pledge to support Operation Edward yesterday.

Police want to encourage all road users to think about their driving and how this can be improved for their own and others’ safety.

Superintendent Kerrin Wilson, Head of the Cleveland and Durham Specialist Operations Unit said: “Aspects of bad driving all combine to make our roads unsafe for a lot of motorists; speeding, seatbelts, mobile phones and drink or drug driving are the fatal four elements which influence this."

Across the two force areas 32 people died in collisions in 2016 – 25 in Durham and seven in Cleveland.