Examination of witnesses (Questions 20
- 39)
WEDNESDAY 19 APRIL 2000
THE LORD
WHITTY, MR
JOHN PLOWMAN
and MR JOHN
KERMAN
20. I see. I have another question, but it is
not particularly on this issue, it is to do with enforcement.
Clearly, one does not have to be an expert to realise that parked
vehicles, pedestrian dangers that are represented by parked vehicles,
and so on, particularly in urban areas, may represent a considerable
factor in the figures that we have, in terms of injuries and deaths.
Are you satisfied that the Home Office is providing the necessary
resources to the police and traffic wardens to fulfil that job
in any reasonable fashion? Secondly, although you said that the
police are giving greater priority to road safety, evidence that
the Committee has received recently suggests that the police simply
are not giving any priority whatsoever to enforcement of traffic
regulations, and so on. Are you aware of that, are you worried
about it and what action do you think ought to be taken to put
that serious matter right?
(Lord Whitty) I am aware of that suggestion, and to
some extent that historically, that, if you count in terms of
manpower, clearly, specialist traffic police have been reduced
over the years. I would say, however, that both the Home Secretary,
in his advice to Chief Constables, and the ACPO Committee themselves,
in their advice to Chief Constables, have pushed back the balance
so that road safety and traffic management are important priorities
for the police.
Chairman
21. And are they written into the core responsibilities
of the Chief Constables?
(Lord Whitty) No, they are not, and, as far as I understand
the situation, they never have been, in that sense, so there is
not a change in that situation. But what has happened over the
last 15 months or so is that the Home Office at top level have
begun to indicate and use the instruments which are now available
to them, for example, under the Crime and Disorder legislation,
to give greater emphasis to road safety issues.
Mr Stevenson
22. I have looked at the targets, for Staffordshire
Police, for example, over the next five years or so, and I must
say that, whilst road safety is mentioned there, I do not see
it as one of the six targets that the Home Office have set the
police, and I have no doubt that may be the case with other Members.
I simply offer evidence from my own patch?
(Lord Whitty) I could not possibly comment on the
operational decisions of the Chief Constable of Staffordshire.
23. I will send you the documents.
(Lord Whitty) Yes, indeed. I think, the six items
which are identified, it is correct that that follows the Home
Office approach, but, within that, the, we call it, thematic report
on policing and the advice gone through quite recently from ACPO
emphasise the safety angle, and I would hope that Chief Constables
took that more seriously.
24. I have two more quick questions on this,
if I might, Lord Whitty, just to follow up what I have just asked.
The document I refer to is called `Best Value', I can think of
no other way of achieving best value, in terms of public resource,
than reducing even further the comparatively good record we have;
but, as you freely admit, much needs to be done, and yet it is
not contained, as far as I can see, in the six Home Office target
priorities given. My other question is, do you think there is
a case, therefore, given that the police do not give this traffic
management role priority, for transferring that power, that responsibility,
to local authorities, and the resources that come from the fines
that are imposed could be used to boost the financial regime for
Local Transport Plans?
(Lord Whitty) As expressed, no, I do not think that
would be a good idea. If we revert to your first question, I think,
the question of resources, there are some resources which local
authorities can deploy, including traffic wardens, and maybe greater
priority in some parts of the country needs to be put on that;
but the shifting from the police of the ability to stop moving
traffic, for example, does seem, to me, actually quite a serious
move, which would not be appropriate. Of course, the other way
of supporting the police, and indeed the traffic warden effort,
is with the improvement of camera technology, the availability
of cameras; and the funding system for cameras that we are now
piloting across the country in eight authorities will, in fact,
return resources to the local authorities, the police and the
courts to cover the costs of that system and road safety improvements.
25. I can see the point about moving traffic,
I was referring specifically to parking infringements?
(Lord Whitty) Yes, I know.
Chairman
26. You will remember that, of course, ACPO
grew almost articulate when they were discussing the fact that
they thought, if a small sum were added to fines, they would have
more than enough money to run not only all the cameras that at
the moment stand empty but also they would have the money to develop
the tape, to use the tape, and to develop film where film was
used. That would be a startling innovation, would it not, for
a start?
(Lord Whitty) That is exactly what this new financial
package and the pilot studies are intended to do.
27. How many pilot studies are there, and where
are they?
(Lord Whitty) There are eight police areas, in England,
Scotland and Wales. I hope that gets rolled out nationally, and
so do the Home Office Ministers.
Chairman: This is a new thing, is it not, `roll
out'; you mean that you have started eight pilot studies: how
good.
Miss McIntosh: I am grateful to the Minister
for instigating a study on road safety on the A1.
Chairman: I cannot have any specific commercials
here.
Miss McIntosh
28. I want only just to thank him, having had
a go at the Minister earlier, it is not all bad news. I gather
that—I think this is identified in the `Tomorrow's Roads—Safer
For Everyone'—while our record on safety on the roads for
pedestrians is high, that is, it is good, that we do not have
too many accidents, the particularly core figures are for 11-14
year olds, and particularly those that are cycling. My concern,
Madam Chairman, is that, if the Government is going to rely simply
on teaching in schools, say, for choices, it may not be enough
on its own, and I just wonder if the Government has got a concrete
programme to come forward to target that group specifically? And,
also, does the Minister share my concern, as I have mentioned
to you, Chairman, before, that the Highway Code, in its present
form, simply is not being observed, that, particularly on rural
lanes, and, obviously, they are mostly in North Yorkshire that
I travel on, you are getting, in country lanes, horses being ridden
two abreast, and cycling two abreast, where it is impossible to
pass them, and where it is aggravating the possibility of accidents?
(Lord Whitty) To take the latter point, I do think
that there are particular problems of both motorised traffic and
other traffic on some country lanes, and it is important that
the responsibility for improved behaviour rests on all road users
and not just motorists, therefore pedestrians and cyclists do
have to pay attention to the Highway Code, and I agree with those
comments. With regard to the statistics on children, I think I
am right in saying that it is the pure pedestrian statistics which
are poor in relation to the rest of Europe, and the child cyclist
figures are more or less the same as the rest of Europe, although
you are also correct to say that in both categories it is the
11-14 year olds who appear to be most vulnerable, particularly
the lower end of that, and there seems to be a particular problem
related to the change of school. That is one of the reasons why
we decided on a higher target for children because we are clearly
failing relative to the other Member States of the European Union
there and we need a special effort on it, in terms of safer routes
to school, safe cycling, and indeed changing the nature of the
roads around schools, and other areas.
Chairman
29. And cycle paths?
(Lord Whitty) And cycle paths, indeed.
Miss McIntosh
30. I wonder if you could also assist the Committee
and explain what a child road safety audit is? And I do not know
if children particularly are concerned by this, but it does concern
me that seat-belts are still not being used by both front and
rear seat passengers, and is the Government minded to campaign
yet again on making sure that people do fulfil their obligation
there?
(Lord Whitty) Yes. On seat-belts, there has been significant
improvement, and, in fact, in terms of front seat-belts, we are
talking about nearly 90 per cent, I think, wearing them; in terms
of back seat-belts, we are still talking of only 50 or 60 per
cent, and we can let you have the exact figures. But one thing
which was clear was that, a very hard-hitting propaganda campaign
that we held and which ran twice last year, those figures increased
dramatically and were sustained, it was one of the most palpable
successes of advertising that I have seen; despite all the claims
of the advertisers, that was the most obvious. So we will be re-running
that, and certainly we regard that as important, particularly
for children.
Chairman
31. And you are telling us that you are going
to do it again?
(Lord Whitty) Yes.
Miss McIntosh
32. And on the child road safety audit?
(Lord Whitty) The child road safety audit; well, this
is requiring local authorities themselves to address the problems
in their areas of child safety, both in terms of the numbers,
in terms of the education programme, which is quite important
both for primary schools, where it tends to be done quite substantially,
and for secondary schools, where hitherto it has been perhaps
a bit neglected; but my colleague John Plowman may wish to add
to this.
(Mr Plowman) I think the key target is to ensure that,
as far as possible, local authorities identify where the major
problems are in their area, as far as child accidents are concerned,
that they identify what is going to be done about the problems,
and that they have some system of monitoring so that we can see
what is happening. The Government does not have ring-fenced expenditure
any more in this area, so it is slightly more difficult to impose
on local authorities, indeed it would be wrong to do so, a particular
requirement to spend a particular amount of money on child road
safety; but the whole idea of the audit is to enable us to see
what is happening and see whether the measures are working.
33. You just said the Government does not have
the money any more?
(Mr Plowman) No. It has the money but it is not ring-fenced,
so there is a block of money for Local Transport Plans but there
is not X million for road safety; within that, there is a sum
which is to be spent on road safety but it is not separately identified.
Chairman
34. But there is not a lot of point in asking
people to do an audit and not giving them the cash with which
to do it, is there?
(Mr Plowman) They have the cash, but they could spend
it in a variety of different ways.
Chairman: Yes, but that is exactly the point
I am making to you. If you require the information to find out
how many children are being killed and injured, and where they
are being killed and injured, and presumably why, and you are
saying to local authorities, "It's now your responsibility
to tell us," then the first thing that you ought to be able
to say to them is, "Here is some money that will enable you
to do it."
Mr Stevenson
35. I wonder if I could ask a question on that,
because I am slightly confused now, because, earlier on, Lord
Whitty did indicate, quite rightly, that his Department does not
wish to ring-fence road safety expenditure because of the fear
of "ghettoising" road safety, which is a fair point;
now we seem to have Mr Plowman saying that, local authorities,
"We really can't identify this being done because of the
change from ring-fencing to a general budget." Now there
seems to be a contradiction there, which is quite apparent; but
could we have clarification of that?
(Mr Plowman) I do not think so. The point is that
we have said that there is no ring-fencing, so there is not a
block of money that you can say is going to be spent automatically
on road safety; but there is a large sum of money out there for
Local Transport Plans and a set of objectives, one of which is
road safety, and local authorities are accountable for how that
money is spent, so some of it has to be spent on road safety.
Chairman
36. I am not clear now. Do you ask them to do
an audit, do you require them to give you the information, or
do you just say, "If you do an audit, we would like to know
what the results are"?
(Mr Plowman) We require them to do an audit.
Mr Stevenson
37. Do they do it?
(Mr Plowman) They have not done it yet.
(Lord Whitty) They have only just finished it.
Mr Stevenson: When will they finally start?
I am sorry, My Lord.
Miss McIntosh
38. Is this part of the Local Transport Plan?
(Mr Plowman) Yes.
(Lord Whitty) The guidance is in the Local Transport
Plan, and the guidance goes to local authorities, but the way
in which they carry out that audit and what policies they themselves
implement, in relation to road safety, is a matter for them, within
the substantially increased resources that we are giving for the
Local Transport Plan, but, because we have emphasised road safety
so strongly within the Local Transport Plan, in output terms,
they are bound to gear a lot of their expenditure and a lot of
their effort to that. There are a few specific schemes which relate
to road safety, as such, for example, there is £5 million
of the money the Chancellor allocated to transport last time which
was for road safety education, both through local authorities
and through the DSA, for which they have to apply, for specific
schemes, but for ongoing purposes it all comes out of the Local
Transport Plan money, which itself has a strong gearing towards
safety.
Chairman
39. A strong gearing towards safety. If this
is not seen to be working within six months, will you, My Lord,
undertake to find out why?
(Lord Whitty) I think six months is too short a period,
Madam Chairman.
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