AN annual service marking the World Day of Remembrance for road traffic victims will be held at Ely Cathedral for the first time on Sunday.

Bridget Wall, one of the event’s organisers, lost her only son Adam aged 24 in a crash on the A47 at Wisbech in November 2002.

The grieving mother hopes the day will encourage a changing of attitudes towards road safety.

She said: “The day is tremendously significant for all of us who have lost loved ones. It is a great way to honour them and let people know we are in this together.

“We remember the victims throughout the world who were killed through no fault of their own.”

Mrs Wall campaigns on behalf of RoadPeace, a national charity for road crash victims which works to improve road safety.

She said: “We don’t use the word ‘accident’. Describing an incident as such trivialises it in every sense and is extremely detrimental to changing attitudes towards safe driving.”

1.3million men, women, young people and children were killed and up to 50 million were maimed or injured worldwide in 2011.

Wisbech resident Jamie Butcher was mown down and killed at a pedestrian crashing in Churchill Road in February last year.

The World Day of Remembrance for Road Traffic Victims, held on every third Sunday of November, was first observed in 1993 and was endorsed by the United Nations as a global day in 2005.

The Ely service begins at 4pm and photographs of some of the crash victims will be on display.

Families will have the chance to write the name and details of their loved ones on paper oak leaves which are then offered up to the altar.

More information about RoadPeace can be found at www.roadpeace.org