A mum whose son broke six bones in his neck when he was hit by a car on his way to school said she still feels awful whenever she drops him off in the morning.

Kelly Louise Newell, 40, said her son, Thomas Willemsen, who was 12, was lucky to be alive after crossing from one side of Spital Road to the other, close to the Three Stags pub, to meet a friend on his way to school when a Ford Fiesta knocked him to the ground.

The incident happened close to the busy Spital crossroads junction, which Kelly called "disorganised chaos".

Kelly said she rushed to the scene after being told her son was lying in the middle of the road by a friend.

Welling up as she spoke, Kelly said she found Thomas lying in the road just a few minutes after the crash and he was screaming "it's my neck, it's my neck".

She added that the shock and tears before she even saw her son after the crash were unimaginable.

Thomas had to wear a neck brace after the crash, as he broke six different bones in his neck.

Speaking to the Local Democracy Reporting Service yesterday, Kelly said: "I feel awful when I drop him off at school, but even with the older son [Daniel, 15], i'm like 'go that way, be careful', so I think it's always going to sit in the back of your mind, the worst case scenario."

After the crash, Kelly set up a petition which attracted around 10,000 signatures calling on Wirral Council to make the junction safer.

Earlier this week, the authority passed a move to improve the junction as part of a set of jobs to be carried out in a Liverpool City Region Combined Authority plan.

Thomas, now 13, who goes to Wirral Grammar School for Boys in Bebington, is now out of the neck brace.

Speaking about Thomas' recovery and the ordeal she has gone through, Kelly added: "I had to have counselling at the back end of last year to retrain my brain from that panic mode.

"But once we got him past the operation in September and were reassured it was the best thing to do for him it kind of worked."

On Thomas' current condition, Kelly said: "I wouldn't say he's made a full recovery yet. He had an operation in September last year on a major fracture in his neck.

"They've had to put four screws and two bars in his neck to force those six bones to come back straight rather than bend forward.

"Otherwise, he would've ended up with not being able to use his arms properly, or his legs, or he would've ended up with a tilt in his neck permanently."

"He's got a beautiful scar on the back of his neck now, but he takes it all in his stride, he's a credit to himself."

She added: "The hospital is happy now, but they want to see him again in [probably] October [as he has a lot of growing to do]."

In a major boost for Thomas, Kelly said he returned to playing hockey, his "passion", earlier this year after not being able to play for 14 months.

Speaking about the emerging plans to improve Spital crossroads, Kelly said: "It's been such a 14-month battle, are they going to do it, are they not?

"Initially highways proposed putting a look left, look right marking on the road."

Last March, Kelly and other volunteers did two weeks of research on Spital Road to look at how many incidents and near misses were happening there during peak times.

Following what appeared to be a major breakthrough for her campaign this week, Kelly wanted to thank everyone who signed the petition, Labour councillor Liz Grey, chair of the council's Environment, Climate Change and Transport Committee, and Conservative councillor Mary Jordan, one of Kelly's local ward councillors.

She said this week's news was the result of a "community effort" and that both councillors kept in touch with her.

Commenting on the junction, Cllr Grey said engineers are working on a plan to improve it and money is available.

She added there was no concrete plan yet, although that would be available in a few weeks time and would look at traffic signal timings and visibility.

Cllr Grey said all road users need to be kept safer, particularly pedestrians and more vulnerable road users such as children and that we will not get people walking and cycling to school if it is not safe to do so.

The Labour councillor added she has worked with Kelly and others on plans to improve road safety, noting that a plan to put more 20mph limits on residential roads was being rolled out across the borough.