THE major roads in and out of Swindon have been rated among the safest in England.

The AA Motoring Trust review of England's major roads has found the four major routes out of the town were, at worst, low to medium risk roads.

The EuroRAP survey found the A419, A346, A338 and the A420 were all in the low to medium risk of death or serious injury category.

The M4 between Swindon and Bristol was deemed low risk.

Between Swindon and London it joined the A-roads in being low to medium risk to the west of Reading before getting safer closer to the capital.

But the report warned that rural main roads that run through villages can be death traps.

Fatal and serious injury accidents are on average five times more likely where rural main roads run through built-up sections than along open-road country sections of the same route.

The trust said that some main roads in Britain are just as dangerous as they were five years ago.

The safest roads are up to 10 times safer than the most dangerous, with single-carriageway roads dominating the list of consistently higher-risk roads.

Motorways are five times safer than the average single-carriageway road and twice as safe as dual carriageways.

Among the most improved roads, casualties have dropped by three-quarters, thanks to measures that encourage drivers to adapt to the sudden change from open road to busier semi-urban layouts.

AA Motoring Trust director Bert Morris said: "People continue to be killed and badly injured because simple, affordable measures that dramatically reduce risk are not being put in place."

The five roads with the consistently highest risk of a fatal or serious injury accident are: the A682, from junction 13 of the M65 to the A65 Long Preston in North Yorkshire; the A54 Congleton to Buxton in Derbyshire; the A61 Barnsley to Wakefield in Yorkshire; the A82 Tyndrum to Tarbet in Stirlingshire, Scotland; and the A623 Baslow road to Chapel-en-le-Frith. Derbyshire.