DEATHS and serious injuries on Merseyside’s roads increased by 10% last year.

Figures released by the Institute of Advanced Motorists (IAM) show the number of incidents across the county jumped from 557 in 2013 to 613 in 2014.

In August, Merseyside Police urged motorists to cut their speed as part of a campaign to reduce road deaths and casualties.

Speeding is one of the major contributory factors in road collisions and officers appealed to motorists to kill their speed before it kills themselves or other road users.

Last year 27 people were killed and nearly 600 people seriously injured on Merseyside's roads with many collisions being as a result of excess speed. Merseyside Police is more determined than ever to reduce this number in 2015.

The force's Roads Policing Department holds monthly campaigns concentrating on different aspects of road safety in a bid to reduce the number of road casualties.

August saw the department focusing on speeding motorists and officers carried out enforcement and educated drivers about the dangers of breaking speed limits.

​During the launch of the campaign, Sergeant Paul Mountford, of the Roads Policing Department, said:  "All too often, our officers attend road traffic collisions where speed has been a major contributory factor. We see the end results - damage to vehicles, disruption to traffic flow and congestion, injury to drivers and other road users and sadly, in some cases the death of a loved one.

"Speed limits are there to save lives and my officers are working hard to reduce collisions on our roads. We will continue to engage with the public to ensure the message to cut speed is heard loud and clear - together we can maximise the safety of all road users and hopefully see reductions in road casualties in 2015.”​

During September, police focused on ‘In Car Safety’ including seat belts, phones and distractions.

Nationally, the IAM found reductions in killed and seriously injured casualties in only a third of police force areas.

Official 2014 figures showed there were 1,775 reported road deaths in 2014, an increase of 4% compared with 2013.

The number of those killed or seriously injured in Britain increased by 5% to 24,582.

There were a total of 194,477 casualties of all severities, an increase of 6%, the first increase in overall casualties in 18 years (reference 1).

IAM chief executive officer Sarah Sillars said: “We want to make clear that a one year comparison cannot be taken as an overall trend of what might be happening in any particular area.

“However 2014 was not a good year for accidents and it should serve as a wake-up call to every road safety partnership that they are under scrutiny and road safety must remain a priority as public sector spending cuts continue. With official figures putting the cost to society of every fatality at over £1.7 million, investment in road safety is money well spent.”