A GRIEVING mother has hit out at a council for delays in putting lower speed restriction signs up at the spot where her son died in a road crash.

Jackie Sadler's 12-year-old son Scott died last February after a car accident while he waited for a school bus near his home in Devauden.

Gwent police stressed after pedestrian Scott's death that the car driver involved was not speeding.

But villagers called for 30mph signs to be put in place of the 40mph signs along the stretch of road.

Campaigners in Devauden, including Scott's family, even installed their own '30mph please signs' on the road.

After lobbying, they were promised new 30mph signs by the end of August by Monmouthshire council.

But we reported in August that the council said it would not be able to meet that deadline because of work commitments. The signs have still not been installed. Scott's mother (pictured) said: "The date gets later and later. We will spend this Christmas without our son and nearly a year on nothing has been done.

"I just hope nobody else has to go through what we've been through before something is done about the problem.

"If they could come out and see for themselves the speeds that some cars reach on that stretch of road, then I'm sure they would have no hesitation in putting up the signs there and then."

Traffic and development manager for Monmouthshire County Council Steve Dudson said: "That promise (to put signs up in August) was made in good in faith at the time. "Unfortunately since then a number of staff have left the authority and we haven't been able to fill the posts because of cost resource problems.

"We have a large workload of small schemes to be completed by the end of this financial year so we have arranged for external consultancies to come in and complete the programme and priority will be given to Devauden."

He said that once all the correct procedures have been followed residents in the Monmouthshire village can expect to see the new signs early in the new year. He said: "We have to go through a statutory process of consultation which hopefully will take place in the next four to six weeks."

Devauden farmer David Maddocks has been campaigning for speed restrictions to be put into place for more than 15 years.

He and Mrs Sadler want the new 30mph signs to be just the beginning of measures to help make the road safe.

He said: "It's totally unacceptable the length of time it is taking to simply replace the 40mph signs."