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Mr. Flynn: The Bill deals with the use of bull bars on roads, but there would be no problem with using demountable bull bars for farming purposes and on private roads.
Mr. Atkinson: With the greatest respect, the hon. Gentleman is making an entirely impractical suggestion. Bull bars are heavy and thus difficult to fix to vehicles. The idea of a demountable bar that can be removed as a vehicle crosses a road from one field to another and then replaced is utterly ludicrous.
Mr. Flynn: There is a range of farm implements that are not allowed to be used on public roads. They have to be taken off when tractors use such roads.
Mr. Atkinson: I do not wish to continue this agricultural debate, but those who know about farm implements will understand that it takes a long time to remove such an implement from, for example, the back of a tractor. The hon. Gentleman's suggestion is impractical.
My hon. Friend the Member for Bury St. Edmunds said that there are no moose or reindeer in this country, but there are deer. One of the reasons why the Lothian and Borders police fitted bull bars to their four-wheel-drive vehicles was the danger of hitting deer. I have seen vehicles--no doubt my hon. Friend has, too--which have hit deer while travelling at 50 mph. In such circumstances, deer can cause a great deal of damage. In Scotland, the problem is caused by red deer.
Mr. Spring:
With respect, my hon. Friend misses the point. Lothian and Borders police have in fact removed
Mr. Atkinson:
I understand that Lothian and Borders police have removed their bull bars, but the reason why they introduced them and why some people like having them on their vehicles is the damage caused by hitting deer. The point that I am trying to make is that bull bars are not exclusively macho accessories--for some people, they are a useful motoring accessory.
Mr. Spring:
Bull bars represent an external danger when hitting, for example, a child, but we know that the crumple zone and the force of energy are such that, if the energy is absorbed by the steel bull bar, the effect is to reduce the safety of the driver and any passengers. Bull bars are not only externally dangerous, but do not preserve the life of the driver or passengers. In fact, the contrary is demonstrably true.
Mr. Atkinson:
I do not want to dispute those particular points, but my point is that people have bull bars on their cars not only for the sake of fashion--although, if they do, that is their choice and taste--but because they need them on, for example, vehicles used regularly on farms, in areas such as the highlands of Scotland, the borders of England and Wales and, indeed, Suffolk, where there are large deer populations. Bull bars are more than fashion accessories to such people.
Before the Bill is passed on the nod, as has been suggested, we must determine the facts. There are two questions to be asked. Are bull bars genuinely a threat to life? I shall return to that in a moment. Secondly, can they be made safe? Can we ensure that, if people want to fit bull bars to their cars, the bull bars are not dangerous?
One of the difficulties with this issue, as with all safety and road safety issues, is that as soon as it is raised,a whole host of pressure groups come out of the woodwork to grind their axes to show their members that they are clever, pretty and enthusiastic, so that they can raise more funds by getting more members. Often in such circumstances, the pressure groups--sadly, in this case, including the RAC--make predictions and often the data, facts and truth get rather blurred. In this case, that is what has happened, because if we consider the available figures in detail, the forecasts of death and injury are extremely misleading.
I accept that the figures that I shall give to the House were produced by another pressure group. I am grateful to Off Road and 4 Wheel Drive magazine for supplying me with the figures.
Mr. Atkinson:
Hon. Members may stand up all over the House, but I wish to finish my point. I am aware that the magazine is also a pressure group, but my point is that we must treat the data that we have at the moment with great suspicion.
Mr. Griffiths:
Does not the hon. Gentleman accept that exactly the same argument was used in the 1970s about seat belt wearing? There were thousands of unnecessary deaths and tens of thousands of unnecessary injuries.The facts here are overwhelming.
Mr. Atkinson:
The hon. Gentleman says that the facts are overwhelming, but in my view the facts are not overwhelming. We should forget the projections. We have had projections of 35 deaths a year from the Transport Research Laboratory, based on figures collected by some police forces in the sample area that my hon. Friend the Minister for Transport in London mentioned. We have had figures of up to 70 deaths from the RAC, but I am not entirely sure about the basis of those figures. But other figures, produced by the Association of Protection Bar Manufacturers--which, I accept, is a vested interest--[Interruption.] The hon. Member for Newport, Westmay laugh, but that organisation represents a £25-million-a-year business, and 1,000 employees.I accept that it is a pressure group, but it is no more and no less of a pressure group--and its evidence is no more and no less questionable--than the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents or any other organisation.
Mr. Flynn:
The hon. Gentleman obviously does not have a financial interest because he would have declared it, but he is speaking on behalf of a group that has an interest in making money out of selling bull bars.The other groups that we have quoted are safety groups, which are interested in road safety and in the well-being of pedestrians and people who drive cars. There are no authoritative figures from his organisation or any other, but the best we can do is to work on the imperfect figures we have. The independent bodies say that there will be 35 or 70 deaths a year.
Mr. Atkinson:
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for accepting that the figures are imperfect. That is exactly the point that I am trying to make, so we do not disagree on that. So we have a situation in which the hon. Gentleman is basing--by his own admission--the need for the Bill on imperfect figures. I do not believe that we should take away someone's liberty and ability to choose on figures that we all admit are imperfect.
A cynic may say that the Association of Protection Bar Manufacturers undoubtedly has a vested interest--the industry makes £25 million a year and employs 1,000 people--but so do the road safety pressure groups. Life in a pressure group today depends on one's success in increasing membership and obtaining funds. That is how people in pressure groups keep their jobs and that is how pressure groups earn the money to advertise for more members. Both sides are grinding axes and--not unreasonably--pushing for their vested interests.
We discovered that, in 1994, there were only six deaths of pedestrians who were killed by cars fitted with bull bars, and only four of those could be blamed in any way on the fact that the car was equipped with a bull bar. One famous case, which the hon. Member for Newport, West mentioned, involved a Mitsubishi Shogun, fitted with a bull bar, which was claimed to have killed a pedestrian. But when the coroner's inquest on the victim examined the evidence in detail, it discovered that he was under the influence of drink at the time, had walked into the side of
the car and was thrown on to some railings at the edge of the pavement. That is how the coroner reported that, but it went down as an accident involving a car with a bull bar.
I am trying to point out that my hon. Friend the Minister should not proceed in any way with the legislation until the data are absolutely copper-bottomed and we are able to show that the right to choose should be taken away from people.
Mr. Flynn:
Is the hon. Gentleman saying that, although we know from all independent expert opinion in the world that bull bars kill and will kill many more people, we have to wait until we are absolutely certain of that and take our action after the deaths? Is he happy to have those deaths on his conscience?
Mr. Atkinson:
I am not happy to have any deaths on my conscience, but is the hon. Gentleman happy to have the deaths that will be caused by young drivers under the age of 25 driving high-performance cars on his? He is saying that we should outlaw everything that could cause any chance of a death, otherwise all hon. Members will have endlessly sleepless nights. It is a preposterous suggestion that we should be railroaded into passing bad legislation on the basis that, if we do not do so, we shall not sleep at night. That is not a way in which the House can continue.
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