I keenly follow your regular comments about the damage to tyres, steering and suspension components by our appalling roads. My 08 reg 11,000 mile S-Max has in the last three months required new anti-roll bar links and two new front struts after spending its short life negotiating the Suffolk’s humps, ruts and potholes. Sections of the A14, the UK's primary link between its industrial heartland and the largest port of Felixstowe, along with many local 'A' roads, are in an atrocious state - making me eternally grateful I am not a motor cyclist. My wife has a Focus the tyres of which became shredded on the inside edges. I have spent nearly forty five years in a variety of roles associated with vehicles: mending, testing, modifying, evaluating and forensically examining them, from fork-lifts to Ferraris, from Jowetts to Juggernauts. I have spent a working lifetime identifying defects and isolating and rectifying the squeaks, rattles and knocks emanating from underneath that many would simply ignore. My S-Max is due for its first MoT test in March 2011, yet until then, apart from servicing by a local dealer there is no 'legal' requirement for anyone stick their head underneath and have a good look round. Those who don't bother having proper servicing may well be death traps despite being less than a couple of years old. Our councils have a lot to answer for; I'm unsure if the term 'fit for purpose' can be applied to roads but what I do know without any doubt is that in the event of a high speed fatality from a vehicle suspension or tyre failure they will immediately adopt the attitude of Pontius Pilate.