The number of police officers dedicated to road policing in England and Wales has fallen sharply over the past decade.

It is sparking fresh concerns from road-safety groups and campaigners who say enforcement shortfalls are linked to worrying trends in road crime and casualties.

Jam sandwich

Analysis of government data by the RAC shows that the cohort of roads-policing officers — those assigned to traffic units and safety camera partnerships — fell from 5,237 in 2015 to just 4,149 in 2025, a reduction of around 21% and more than 1,000 officers in total.

The number of staff working specifically on safety camera partnerships also fell, from 186 a decade ago to 144 now. 

This staffing decline follows longer-term cuts, particularly during the ‘austerity’ policies of the Cameron/Osborne government post 2010.

A Police Foundation review found notable reductions in traffic-policing numbers earlier in the decade, reporting an initial 22% fall between 2010 and 2014 and a further 18% decline from 2015 to 2019.

The Foundation described the situation as risking making roads “less safe.” 

Who’s behind the wheel

Those staffing losses come as headline casualty figures show that tens of thousands of people are still being killed or seriously injured on Britain’s roads each year.

Government statistics for 2023 reported an estimated 1,645 fatalities, a 4% decline from 2022, with 29,643 people recorded as killed or seriously injured (KSI) in the latest provisional counts.

Road safety specialists say those year-on-year shifts mask persistent problems on certain road types and among particular user groups. 

Campaigners and some politicians argue there is a direct connection between fewer visible traffic officers and rising levels of enforceable offences such as speeding, drink- and drug-driving, and uninsured driving.

Combine this with the same governments’ abandonment of road safety targets, and many analysts believe it has led to a plateauing of road safety achievements, despite considerable improvements to vehicle safety.

Carrots and sticks

The RAC’s analysis and several industry commentaries say fewer officers mean fewer proactive patrols, less breath testing and fewer officers to run camera and enforcement programmes.

These are all measures traditionally credited with deterring risky behaviour. 

However, Police forces counter that roads policing has evolved: technology such as fixed and mobile speed cameras, ANPR (automatic number-plate recognition) and telematics increasingly supplement staffing.

Forces add that they have to balance finite resources against other crime priorities.

Officials point to broader national workforce trends, noting that although overall officer numbers in England and Wales have risen slightly in recent years, the distribution of those officers has not restored previous levels of dedicated roads teams.

Regional data paint a mixed picture.

In Scotland, for example, the number of full-time road traffic officers fell from 568 in 2019 to around 518 by mid-2024, prompting warnings from opposition politicians that sustained cuts risk lives.

However, Scottish authorities say they are investing in other safety measures.

See it to believe it

Road-safety experts say the policy implications are clear: if enforcement capacity continues to decline, greater emphasis will be needed on alternatives — better camera coverage, tougher licensing and insurance checks, and targeted education — to prevent the kinds of collisions that still account for more than a thousand deaths a year.

Even with the rise of technological tools, they still fail to have the deterrent effect of road police seen on the roads.

Without robust, independent evaluation of the balance between officers and technology, they warn, Britain risks trading visible policing for uncertain safety gains.