into a box marked speed cameras"
- Kevin Delaney, Metropolitan Police
The government justifies its use of more than 6,000 speed cameras across the country on the grounds that they cut road deaths and serious injuries. But now these figures have been called into question and critics say this could undermine the entire programme, which brings in more than £100 million in fines every year. In what critics are describing as an embarrassing about-turn, the DfT is to re-evaluate the way it works out the number of serious injuries reported on the roads. It had relied on the figures gathered by police rather than hospital admissions, but the discrepancy between the two has forced officials to look again.
According to the police the number of serious injuries between 1996 and 2004 fell from 79.7 per 100,000 to 54, and it's these figures that have traditionally been used to show that speed cameras are being effective in cutting down road accidents. However, the corresponding figures from hospitals showed a rise from 88.8 to 90.1. Whitehall had insisted that the police figures were robust and that there was no need to use the hospital data. But shortly the DfT will publish its findings on whether it should use hospital admission figures as a basis for future policy.
"We have put our entire road safety programme into a box marked speed cameras," said Kevin Delaney, the Metropolitan Police's former head of traffic. "The figures were the justification for the policy and if they are called into doubt the whole thing is undermined".
Since the arrival of speed cameras, the rate at which casualty figures were improving has slowed dramatically. In 1966 the decrease in casualties was 17.8%. In 1976 it was 18.1%, and in 1986 it was a whopping 33.2%. Then the police patrol cars left our roads and were replaced by cameras, and the rate of improvement dropped to only 11.8%.
As if all this isn't enough, the latest DfT figures show for the first time that only 1 in 50 injury crashes involving drivers over the age of 25 also involves exceeding the speed limit.
This fact speaks for itself. They've picked the wrong target. Recent figures also show that a very high percentage of accidents involve young unlicensed and therefore uninsured drivers. Instead of victimising the average road-user who drives in a safe and responsible manner, the road safety industry should be concentrating its efforts on these younger drivers who are killing and maiming out of all proportion.
IN 2003 the DfT published a report called "Research into Unlicensed Driving". This estimated that there are around 6,300 casualties annually as a result of crashes involving an unlicensed driver and around 900 of these are killed or seriously injured. Not all crashes involving unlicensed drivers are detected and not all are prosecuted, so it is possible that the numbers represent an underestimate. The report found, by comparing crashes involving unlicensed drivers with all crashes, that …
• they typically involve a higher severity
• they involve a higher number of casualties and passengers are significantly over-represented
• the age of these casualties is lower and there are more males
• a higher proportion occurs on unclassified roads, and where speed is restricted
• the greatest number of crashes tend to occur at the evening peak, but weekend crashes are over-represented, as are those late in the evening or early morning
• there is a higher proportion of motorcyclists involved in crashes involving unlicensed drivers compared with crashes involving licensed drivers.
It also found that the unlicensed drivers involved in these crashes …
• tend to be male
• are younger (average age 28 years) than the average crash-involved driver (average age 37 years)
• are significantly more likely to produce a positive breath-test result
But I think we all knew that, didn't we? So why hasn't the road safety industry taken it on board and made it their priority?
Couldn't have anything to do with raising the money to pay their own salaries, at all?
The GOS says: The bulk of this page was taken from the pages of "On the Road", the brilliant magazine published to its members by The Association of British Drivers. The ABD is an excellent organisation. It's not a club for boy-racers - the GOS is a member, for a start! - and it campaigns for improved road-user training, real transport choices, investment in Britain's roads and, above all, honesty on transport issues (if only!).
The GOS thinks that anyone who believes British drivers (and that's virtually all of us, isn't it?) are being hounded, criminalized and ripped off, should join. Go on, you know it makes sense.
either on this site or on the World Wide Web.
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