The executive president of Global NCAP believes the the UK has suffered a wasted decade of action on road safety.

In his latest opinion piece for Road SafetyGB, David Ward outlines why a change of Government represents ‘a welcome opportunity to revive the UK’s failing road safety policies’.

More than money

Ward believes the new Labour government faces huge challenges beyond the £20 billion black hole in the finances.

He states that there are “huge performance deficits too, notably in road safety”.

In the first decade of the 2000’s, UK road deaths almost halved.

However, since then, a series of Conservative administrations and their theme of austerity,  “progress has stalled”.

“Annually, we suffer 30,000 deaths and serious inquiries – equivalent to devastating a medium sized town every year,” writes Ward. “The anguish and pain caused to so many families are unimaginable but the social and economic costs amount to a staggering $43.5 billion each year.

Carnage

In his estimations, Ward believes that the failures to continue the progresses in road safety across the UK have led to at least 40,000 avoidable deaths and serious injuries.

Fourteen years of missed opportunities and complacency has also meant that the UK has lost its claimto be a global leadership in road injury prevention.

“Since 2012 twenty-five countries have outperformed the UK in reducing road fatalities”.

This is despite valuable work by the previous Labour minister Jim Fitzpatrick and the DfT.

Their report ‘A Safer Way’ published in 2009 made proposals for a shift towards a growing international support for ‘safe systems’ strategies for injury prevention.

Missing the point

In 2011 a new strategic framework was published in which ambitious casualty reduction targets were thrown out.

In their place, Philip Hammond the then Secretary of State for Transport prioritised “education and training instead of more bureaucracy, targets and regulation”.

Ward, along wit many road safety experts, regarded this as a step back.

Rather than an integrated plan for safer roads, safer vehicles, and safer road users envisaged in ‘A Safer Way’, it placed full responsibility on road users.

While there was. positive move to greater local authority responsibility to improve road safety, austerity meant there was no funding.

Core funding of local authorities since 2010 has been cut, “hobbling efforts to maintain roads and fix potholes, let alone improve local road safety”.

At the same time, road policing was also devastated by cuts.

According to the Police Federation numbers of traffic police fell by 22% between 2010-2014 and then again by 18% between 2015-2019.

Policing road safety

In 2022 a poll by Auto Express revealed that 83% of drivers want to see more road patrols.

A Home Office Strategic Policing Framework, a long-delayed review announced by DfT in 2020, still  hasn’t been published.

“Against this background it is hardly surprising that in July DfT reported that the central estimate of fatalities caused by drink driving collisions is the highest since 2009. This shows clearly how the 2011 shift to ‘education and training’ unsupported by enforcement was a predictable failure,” says Ward.

The anti-regulation bias adopted by the DfT in 2011 was only exacerbated by Brexit in 2016. Previously the UK had a proud record of leading improved vehicle safety through the European Union (EU).

The UK strongly promoted new crash test standards in the late 1990s and DfT was a founder member of the European NCAP.

Opportunity

A change of Government is now “a welcome opportunity to revive the UK’s failing road safety policies”, writes Ward.

“That is why I was delighted to support the Manifesto for Road Safety 2024 jointly issued by the Parliamentary Advisory Council for Transport Safety on behalf of the UK road safety community”

The manifesto outlines four strategic priorities:

  • Developing a National Road Safety Strategy – Implement a Safe System Strategy focused on prevention, protection, and post-collision response, coupled with evidence-based targets and robust safety performance indicators.
  • Establishing a Road Safety Investigation Branch – An independent body modelled after existing transportation safety branches to analyse road incidents and provide actionable insights for preventing future tragedies.
  • Introducing Graduated Driver Licensing – – A progressive licensing system to support young drivers by limiting high-risk driving situations, a measure proven to reduce casualties from collisions involving a 17-to 19-year-old driver by up to 40%”.
  • Adopting Advanced Vehicle Safety Regulations – Immediate implementation of the full GSR package of world-leading vehicle safety standards.

“Action on these manifesto recommendations,” comments Ward, “would be a great way to signal a return to evidence-based policymaking that can restore dynamism to the UK’s road safety performance. It would also help recover the UK’s previous reputation for global leadership in road safety. ”

Read David Wards full article here.