Young drivers across Warwickshire will today start to see a new campaign from road safety project The Honest Truth.  The Honest Truth have developed a new campaign focussing on the consequences of drinking and driving – the truth.

By working with well known road safety evaluators especially skilled in the use of behaviour change theory, the new campaign seeks to raise awareness of some of the consequences of drink driving.  It is now understood that due to ‘optimism bias’ young drivers are less likely to be persuaded by suggestions that they will be killed due to a belief that ‘it won’t happen to me’.  The nearer the consequences are, the more likely they are to act on them.

Therefore, the campaign focusses on the more likely consequences of drink driving such as going to prison, losing their licence or their mates. It also has a focus on ‘social norms’ – young people are influenced by their peers and want to fit into a group by use of the thought that ‘most people don’t drink drive’.

The campaign also continues to use the unique and striking animal head imagery it has from the beginning of the campaign over 10 years ago but now brought up to date.

The campaign will appear across the Warwickshire region on 48 sheet billboards and 6 sheet bus stops till the end of 2019. It will also be seen across a number of digital platforms.

The campaign is funded by Warwickshire Police and Crime Commissioner Philip Seccombe.  Funding has been provided to deliver road safety messages to young drivers, ensuring they understand the risks the road can present and how to be a safer driver.

Annette Lloyd, Head of The Honest Truth said, ‘We are pleased that the campaign has been developed and will be widely seen across Warwickshire and grateful to the support from Warwickshire Police and Crime Commissioner. This is a new campaign with a new take on road safety messaging and we are delighted to have been able to develop the campaign in line with current road safety evidence base.”