Sister of driver killed on M1 smart motorway backs calls for roll-out to be halted

The sister of a delivery driver killed on the M1 after he failed to find a safe refuge following a minor collision has backed calls for the roll-out of smart motorways to be halted.

Alexandru Murgeanu, 22, and Jason Mercer, 44, were killed when hit by a lorry after they stopped to exchange insurance details on the hard shoulder which had been opened to traffic.

The men, who died in June, were the third and fourth people to die on the stretch of smart motorway in 10 months.

Mr Murgeanu’s sister, Andreea, has added her name to a growing list of grieving relatives of those killed who fear removing the hard shoulder is putting lives at risk. The government has promised to nearly double the smart motorway network from 416 to 788 miles.

Speaking from her home in Barlad, Romania, Ms Murgeanu said: “I am really afraid that unless safety issues regarding smart motorways are reviewed more families may lose loved ones.

“The British government must do something to ensure people are safe if they are going to continue to build them.

“Four people dying on the same stretch of motorway means you have to ask whether smart motorways contributed to these tragedies.”

Last week, the Sunday Telegraph revealed how four people stranded on a 16-mile stretch of M1 have been killed. Last September, a 62-year-old woman died after a car she was in broke down near Sheffield before being hit by another vehicle. In March, Derek Jacobs, 83, died when his Volkswagen Crafter got a puncture on the M1 in Derbyshire and was hit by a coach.

Ms Murgeanu, 25, has now backed Claire Mercer, Mr Mercer’s widow’s call for a judicial review into whether smart motorways are safe.

Explaining how she and her brother moved to Britain two years ago, and Alexandru became a Yodel delivery driver three months before his death, she said: “Alexandru loved Britain. His death has shocked his family. We miss him so much. I don’t want other families to lose loved ones in this way.”

After her brother’s death Ms Murgeanu could not bear to stay in Britain and so returned to Romania.