Memorandum from Brake (RS 60)
ABOUT BRAKE
1. Brake, the national road safety charity,
is dedicated to stopping deaths and injuries on roads and caring
for people bereaved and affected by road crashes. Brake carries
out research into road users' attitudes on aspects of road safety.
It also works with people bereaved and seriously injured in road
crashes to campaign for changes in the law, which will benefit
road safety and provide much needed support for road crash victims.
To what extent have targets for casualty reduction
been a useful tool for focusing professional activity?
2. Targets can be extremely valuable in
focussing activity and enabling stakeholders to gauge the success,
or failure, of casualty reduction strategies. Targets are successfully
used by organisations to help to motivate action to achieve results.
However, the existing casualty reduction targets, as set by the
Department for Transport (DfT) in 2000, had several limitations
to their usefulness:
2.1 The targets were a long way to being met
before they were even introduced. The targets were set in 2000,
but were based on casualty statistics from the 1994-98 baseline
average. This meant that when the targets were introduced in 2000,
several years had already passed, so significant reductions in
casualties had already occurred. There had already been a 13%
reduction in all KSIs from the baseline figure used before the
target was set in 2000, and a 24% reduction in child KSIs by the
same time. This meant that the targets were no where near as challenging
as they appeared to be, and did not give an accurate picture of
what was expected to be achieved over the 10-year period around
which the strategy was based.
2.2 The targets were not challenging enough.
Europe as a whole has a higher target—aiming to reduce the
number of road crash fatalities alone by half by 2010. The fact
that reducing road casualties does not appear to be a top priority
for legislators or enforcers is symptomatic of the absence of
motivating, challenging targets. Road crashes receive just a couple
of paragraphs in the National Policing Plan, suggesting that enforcement
of road traffic offences are not a priority. Road safety does
not feature highly on the agenda of legislators either—despite
the target being set in 2000, a long-promised Road Safety Act
was delayed and was not passed until 2006, meaning crucial road
safety measures requiring legislation had to be put on hold.
2.3 The targets were set for reducing `KSI's
(people killed and seriously injured) combined, as an assumption
was made that deaths and injuries would follow a similar trend.
In fact, the number of deaths on the road is falling at a much
slower rate than the number of serious injuries—the Transport
Research Laboratory (TRL) forecasts that if the fatality trend
was to persist and no new measures were introduced then the number
of fatalities would fall by just 19% by 2010.[93]
It is clear that in order for targets to be meaningful, it is
necessary to have separate targets for deaths and serious injuries.
2.4 The targets were not as wide-ranging as they
could have been, and left significant gaps. Only one specific
road-user group—children—was identified and given
a separate target from the main, general target. There is no clear
reason why this road-user group was selected while others were
not. It would make sense for specific targets to be given to road-user
groups that are particularly at risk or have disproportionately
high crashes or casualty rates. DfT could have conducted an analysis
of which groups are most at risk and set individual targets for
these groups. For example, it could have been helpful to have
separate targets for child pedestrians and cyclists, as casualty
rates for this group are particularly poor in comparison to the
rest of the EU. Other at-risk groups include young drivers, motorcyclists
and at-work drivers.
What further measures need to be adopted to reduce
deaths and injuries arising from drinking and driving?
3. There is evidence that the number of
drink-drive crashes is rising—17% more people were killed
in drink-drive crashes in 2006 than in 1998. Estimates for 2006
suggest that 17% of road deaths and 6% of all road casualties
occurred when someone was driving while over the legal limit for
alcohol.[94]
4. There are a number of measures that need
to be adopted to reduce deaths and injuries arising from drinking
and driving:
4.1 The Government should reduce the drink-drive
limit. The UK and Ireland are the only remaining EU countries
to have a limit of 0.8 BAC (Blood Alcohol Content), and Ireland
has pledged to reduce this limit by 2009. Most countries have
a drink-drive limit of 0.5 BAC. Some countries (such as Sweden,
Poland and Estonia), have limits of 0.2 BAC while some have limits
of 0.0 BAC (Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary).[95]
4.1.1 The European Commission adopted a recommendation
in January 2001 which proposed harmonisation of the BAC level
at 50mg (0.5 BAC) or below[96]
and it is estimated that reducing the drink-drive limit in Britain
to 0.5 BAC would save about 65 lives and 230 serious injuries
per year.[97]
4.1.2 There is widespread support among the
public for a lower drink-drive limit: of those who responded to
the consultation paper "Combating Drink Driving: Next Steps",
79% were in favour of a lower limit, 14% were against and the
remainder had no clear view.[98]
4.1.3 When Sweden lowered its drink-drive
limit from 0.5 BAC to 0.2 BAC in 1990 fatal alcohol-related crashes
were reduced by 10%. Similar experiences were found in Austria,
Belgium and France after lowering their drink-drive limits.[99]
The evidence for reducing the limit is overwhelming. A limit of
0.2 BAC or lower sends a clear and consistent message to drivers
that they cannot drink at all if they are driving, ending confusion
about how much is "too much" and would be likely to
lead to a significant reduction in drink-drive casualties.
4.2 The Government needs to type-approve roadside
breathalysing equipment and to ensure all forces are equipped
with the tools they need to perform evidential tests at the roadside.
Having equipment to perform evidential breath tests at the side
of the road saves the time and money of taking the driver back
to the police station for tests, and allows an instant test to
be given, rather than giving a test some time after being stopped.
This frees up police time to get back on the roads and enforce
road traffic laws.
4.3 Police should be given the power to perform
random, targeted and blanket breath-tests. In most EU countries
the police are entitled to use random breath testing, which means
they do not have to have any cause to believe a driver is over
the drink-drive limit before stopping and testing them. The only
exceptions to this are Denmark, UK and Ireland. The power to test
drivers randomly allows police to target particular areas or drivers—for
example, stopping drivers driving away from town on a Friday night
at closing time. It also allows them to perform blanket checks
by setting up road blocks and stopping cars at regular intervals
or stopping every passing car. This flexibility, when combined
with increased enforcement is designed to make drivers feel they
have a good likelihood of being caught if they break the law.
A Swiss study in 1998 found that random breath testing was one
of the most cost-effective safety measures that can be implemented.
In 2005, Switzerland achieved a huge 20% drop in road deaths,
and preliminary figures show that this trend is continuing. Swiss
Government analysis reports that the main reason for this has
been a better control of two of the main causes of crashes—speed
and alcohol. On 1 January 2005, the legal blood alcohol limit
was lowered from 0.8 to 0.5 BAC and police were empowered to run
random breath tests.[100]
Minimum levels of random breath testing is also one of the main
elements of the 2004 European Commission Recommendation on Enforcement
in the Field of Road Safety.
4.4 In many countries, alcohol interlocks, which
require drivers to take and pass a breath test before their car
engine will start, are used as a condition of probation for drink-drive
offenders after their driving licence has been reinstated. As
of 2006, 45 US states, the District of Columbia and most Canadian
provinces and territories require or allow some offenders to use
alcohol interlocks.[101]
There is significant evidence for the effectiveness of alcohol
interlocks in reducing repeat drink-drive offences:
4.4.1 An alcohol interlock study was carried
out in Maryland, USA in the 1990s.The results indicated that being
given an alcohol interlock reduced the risk of an alcohol-related
traffic offence within the first year by about 65%.[102]
4.4.2 An alcohol interlock programme began
in Alberta, Canada, in 1990. After six years the re-offending
rate for the group which used alcohol interlocks was 18%, compared
to 38% for the control group.[103]
5. The Road Safety Act 2006 provides for
the possibility of using alcohol interlocks for offenders in exchange
for a reduction in the period of disqualification. The Government
should run pilots using alcohol interlocks with a view to rolling
this out if successful.
How does Great Britain compare with other EU countries
in its approach to reducing deaths and injuries?
6. Unlike some EU countries which have the
lowest road death and injury rates, Britain does not have a clear,
ambitious vision for reducing road crashes and deaths and perhaps
as a consequence of this lack of a "vision", road safety
does not feature highly on the political agenda.
7. Although it sets casualty reduction targets,
as do other EU countries, prior to recent speeches by the current
road safety minister, the Government had not made any clear acknowledgement
that every road death is unacceptable. Sweden expresses its view
that it is unacceptable for there to be a single death or injury
on the roads through "Vision Zero"—the vision
is that eventually no one will be killed or seriously injured
within the road transport system.[104]
Britain should follow Sweden's lead and make it clear that it
is ethically intolerable that deaths and injuries should continue
on the road. This would help to focus policies, strategies and
legislation by having a clear aim and ambition.
8. Other countries also demonstrate that
road safety can, and should, be prioritised by Government. On
14 July 2002, President Jacques Chirac declared the "fight
against road violence" one of the top three priorities of
his second term in office. In Luxembourg, road safety has been
declared one of the first political priorities. The UK needs to
follow these examples in order to make tackling road deaths and
injuries a clear political priority.
How do approaches in reductions in risk on the
roads compare to those adopted in other modes of transport?
9. There is a general perception perpetuated
by Government that road deaths are not as disastrous as deaths
occurring on planes or trains. Plane or train crashes are treated
like national disasters, with Government ploughing massive resources
into its emergency response, and into investigations following
the event. In contrast, because of their frequency, road crashes
are often treated like unavoidable facts of life, with one of
the main aims of the emergency response being to get traffic moving
quickly, rather than focussing on investigating the crash.
10. The Government approach to plane and
train crashes is that no risk will be tolerated. This is evident
from the level of training required of pilots and train drivers,
which is far more extensive than the training required for driving
a car. Medical checks and extended periods of practical training
are required before people legally able to take responsibility
for the lives of their passengers on a plane or train. Yet with
no professional training, no medical check, and with very little
driving experience, people are able to drive on busy carriageways
with passengers in their vehicle.
11. The fact that there is a lower drink-drive
limit for train drivers and pilots than for car drivers is another
indication that risks that the Government will tolerate on the
road, will not be tolerated for other modes of transport. While
the Government deems it acceptable to allow car drivers to drive
with 0.8 BAC—a level that allows them to be intoxicated
and for their faculties to be impaired—the legal limit for
plane and train drivers is 0.2 BAC, meaning they cannot have a
single drink before taking control of their vehicles. The reluctance
of Government to take the simple step of reducing the drink-drive
limit for car drivers demonstrates that they consider risks on
the road to be more acceptable than risks on the railways or in
the air, despite the fact that many, many more deaths and injuries
occur on the roads than on trains and planes put together.
12. Variations in acceptable risks when
it comes to engineering are startlingly obvious. Mechanics do
not need a qualification, meaning cars can be maintained by people
with no expertise, and no guarantee that the vehicle is safe or
roadworthy. In contrast, aircraft maintenance mechanics undergo
thorough training and must re-train as new equipment becomes available.
13. Resources devoted to crash investigation
also highlight the difference in approach to different modes of
transport. One example of the resources given to investigating
crashes on other modes of transport is the Rail Accident Investigation
Branch (RAIB), the independent railway accident investigation
organisation for the UK. It investigates railway accidents and
incidents on the UK's railways to improve future safety on trains.
No similar body exists for road crashes, and often minimal time
or manpower is given to investigating crashes. The police investigation
is a key element in securing the decision to prosecute by the
Crown Prosecution Service, as well as an actual conviction in
court, but is all too often left to just one or two police officers,
whose main concern is to clear the road and get traffic moving
following a crash. A good first step towards this measure would
be to adopt the Association of Chief Police Officers' Road Death
Investigation Manual as a statutory requirement to ensure a comprehensively
high standard of "accident investigation". Currently
all forces are signed up to the manual, but follow it to different
extents.
Are there specific blockages caused by shortages
of appropriately trained and skilled staff?
14. There are shortages of trained and skilled
police officers able to efficiently enforce road traffic law.
More dedicated road traffic officers trained in a whole range
of traffic checks and enforcements would allow for improved enforcement
of traffic law and would act as a disincentive to those who might
currently break the law because they think they can get away with
it.
15. Brake is also concerned that numbers
of front line VOSA enforcement staff have increased only minimally
during the past few years and numbers of enforcement checks have
fallen.[105]
Brake is concerned that a lack of trained staff and decreasing
checks means commercial vehicle safety is not being adequately
enforced.
16. Shortages of Road Safety Officers (RSOs)
mean community road safety education does not live up to its life-saving
potential. We hear anecdotally from RSOs that they do not have
enough staff to give all the training and education they would
like to schools. Increased numbers of RSOs would allow for improved
road safety education.
17. There is a shortage of road crossing
patrols. In recent years, the number of lollipop men and women
has declined at an alarming rate. In 2005, at least 25% of posts
were vacant across the country.[106]
Research carried out by Jet in 2005 showed that the safety of
school children across the UK was in jeopardy due to the continued
shortage of crossing patrols. Councils across the country reported
an average 18% shortage an in some areas the shortage was much
higher—in the London Borough of Lambeth shortfalls were
as high as 70%.[107]
What further policies, not already widely used,
might be considered for adoption and what evidence there is for
their success?
18. Brake recommends that the following
policies are considered for adoption:
Graduated Driver Licensing (GDL)
19. There is currently no minimum learning
period or requirement for professional tuition, which means novice
drivers may obtain a full driver licence aged 17, without adequate
tuition and with very little experience. Brake would like to see
the introduction of GDL to allow new drivers to build up their
driving skills and experience gradually and help prevent the tragic
deaths of young people on our roads.
20. Brake proposes a three-stage licence
comprising of a learner period followed by a test, and a novice
period during which time restrictions would be placed on the driver
before drivers could obtain a full licence. GDL has been implemented
in many other countries such as New Zealand and the US, with high
levels of success. Following the introduction of the GDL system
in New Zealand, there was a reduction in car crash injuries of
23% for 15-19 year olds and 12% for 20-24 year olds. After GDL
was introduced in the State of Washington, USA, annual fatal and
serious crashes involving 16 and 17 year-old drivers fell by 59%.
21. For more information, visit the Licensed
to Kill? campaign on Brake's website www.brake.org.uk.
Regular re-testing
22. The current system of allowing drivers
to drive for life after taking just one test does little to ensure
drivers keep their skills and knowledge up-to-date. A driver's
standard of driving, knowledge of the rules of the road, or medical
fitness to drive may decrease over time, and so regular re-testing
is vital to ensure that all drivers are competent and safe. This
has been acknowledged by Government when it comes to commercial
vehicle drivers who must complete a Certificate of Professional
Competence which must be renewed every five years, with a minimum
35 hours of approved training every five years. Regular checks
for competence are equally important for other drivers because
all drivers, professional or not, put lives at risk on the road.
Time-over-distance speed cameras
23. A policy should be undertaken to replace
all fixed-site cameras with "time over distance" cameras.
Time over distance cameras provide a better incentive for drivers
to slow down and stay within speed limits for longer stretches
of road, rather than just slowing down for a fixed-site camera,
and then speeding up. A recent report found that the use of SPECS
time over distance cameras reduced vehicles exceeding the speed
limit by 53%, and those exceeding it by more than 15 mph by 100%.[108]
20 mph limits
24. We need a default 20 mph speed limit
in urban areas. At the moment, 20 mph limits are at the discretion
of local authorities who follow recently-reviewed guidelines from
the Department for Transport on setting speed limits.[109]
These guidelines recommend that the needs of children are taken
into account, and give some encouragement to local authorities
to install 20mph limits. However, communities that campaign for
20mph limits around their schools by lobbying their councils are
still often turned down on the basis that "there hasn't been
a death yet", or because there is a lack of funding, or because
the importance of traffic flow is prioritised on a particular
urban road. The Government doesn't monitor how many 20mph limits
have been installed; in effect abdicating all responsibility to
local authorities.
25. Yet the evidence is clear—reducing
the speed limit will save lives. The first three 20 mph zones
in the UK were implemented in January 1991. Five years later,
the Transport Research Laboratory reviewed the results from 250
zones in England, Wales and Scotland. The average speed in these
areas fell by 9 mph. The total number of crashes fell by 60% and
the number of accidents involving children fell by 67%. The number
of crashes involving cyclists also fell, by 27%.[110]
In 2003, the Health Development Agency called for a reduction
in the speed limit to 20 mph on residential streets. It estimated
that this measure would reduce child deaths and injuries by a
massive 67%—or 13,000 children—each year.[111]
26. One local authority that has led the
way is Hull City Council, which has introduced 20 mph zones on
a quarter of its roads. There has been a 74% reduction in the
number of crashes involving child pedestrians, and a 69% reduction
in child cyclist crashes in the three years since the zones' introduction,
compared with the three before the speed limit changed. The overall
number of crashes in Hull has been reduced by 56%, and there has
been a 90% reduction in serious or fatal injury collisions.
27. Not only does reducing speed reduce
the frequency of crashes, but it also reduces the severity of
any crashes that do occur—there is a direct relationship
between the speed of a vehicle and the severity of injuries. At
40 mph, 85% of people hit by vehicles die, at 30 mph, 20% of people
die and at 20 mph it is just 5%.[112]
28. For more information, visit the "Watch
Out There's a Kid About" campaign on Brake's website www.brake.org.uk.
More roads police
29. The number of police officers with responsibility
for roads policing duties has fallen over the past decade despite
the consistent increase in traffic volumes over this period. According
to HM Inspectorate of Constabulary, in 1996-97 there were 9,201
dedicated road policing officers, while by 2003-04 this number
had fallen to 7,636.[113]
Some forces have scrapped their road policing units, creating
"rapid response units" or "problem-oriented policing"
(POP) units, which combine road policing duties with other activities.
30. This increasing under-resourcing of
roads policing means there is a lack of routine enforcement on
our roads, such as speed, drink-drive, seat belt, mobile phone
and tyre checks. It also means that in many forces, budgets for
training and equipment for traffic police have been slashed.
31. We need to see a commitment from Government
to putting more trained roads policing officers on our roads.
32. For more information, see Brake's "Police
Our Roads" campaign page on its website www.brake.org.uk.
Compulsory road safety education
33. Road safety education is not a compulsory
part of the National Curriculum and often not taught, despite
the availability of teaching resources from the Department for
Transport and other agencies. We want compulsory, effective, road
safety education for children of all ages to teach our children
to be as safe as possible when using roads. The National Healthy
Schools Programme is dedicated to making children healthier, happier
and safer,[114]
yet road safety does not feature as a key theme of this initiative,
despite the fact that road deaths are one of the biggest single
causes of death for children, and despite the fact that in a recent
Brake survey, 48% of children said they worried about being knocked
down while walking or cycling.[115]
Traffic kills children and affects their health, happiness and
well-being, so it is ludicrous that road safety it is not a compulsory
element of children's education.
Improved vehicle technology
34. In the longer term we need the Government
to develop strategies around emerging vehicle technology. This
includes creating legislation that makes use of GPS-linked speed-limiters
and technology to record driver behaviour and journey patterns.
There are several other very simple steps that could be taken
to improve the safety of vehicles, such as making it compulsory
for high-sided vehicles to have retro-reflective tape to improve
the visibility of high-sided vehicles.
What should be the priorities for Government in
considering further targets for casualty reduction beyond 2010?
35. When setting its targets for beyond
2010, the Government should prioritise setting casualty reduction
targets for road users who have a disproportionate crash and casualty
rates. If current trends continue, Brake recommends that the Government
targets speeding drivers, drink-drivers, young drivers, child
pedestrians and cyclists and motorcyclists, all of which have
disproportionately high crash and casualty rates.
February 2008
93 Tomorrow's Roads-safer for Everyone, Second three-year
review, DfT, April 2007. Back
94
Road casualties Great Britain 2006: Annual report-September 2007. Back
95
Drink Driving: Legislation, European Transport Safety Council,
www.etsc.be/home Back
96
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/smartapi/cgi/sga_-doc?smartapi!celexplus!prod!JO-RefPub&lg=en&serie_jo=L&an_jo=2001&pg_jo=31&nu_jo=43 Back
97
Professor Richard E Allsop Centre for Transport Studies University
College London, http://www.pacts.org.uk/parliament/briefings/lowerlimit.pdf Back
98
Tomorrow's Roads-Safer for Everyone: The second three year review,
DfT, February 2007. Back
99
http://www.ias.org.uk/resources/publications/theglobe/globe200302/gl200302-p3.html Back
100
Road Safety Performance Index-Making progress happen-ETSC 2006. Back
101
MADD International Technology Symposium, Summary Report, November
2006. Back
102
Alcohol Interlock Implementation in the European Union; Feasibility
Study, (SWOV Institute for Road Safety Research, 2001). Back
103
Alcohol Interlock Implementation in the European Union; Feasibility
Study, (SWOV Institute for Road Safety Research, 2001). Back
104
Swedish Ministry of Transport and Communications, 1997. Back
105
Effectiveness Report 2006-07, VOSA 2007. Back
106
School-run Violence Drives Lollipop People Off the Roads,
(LARSOA, 2005). Back
107
Jet Lollipop Barometer, (Jet, 2005). Back
108
The National Safety Camera Programme: A Four Year Evaluation
Report, University College, London and PA Consulting Group,
2005. Back
109
Chapter 5: "Shared Priority-Safer Roads", Local Transport
Plan 2006-11 (Hull City Council, 2006). Back
110
TRL Report 215-"Review of Traffic Calming Schemes in 20 mph
zones. Back
111
Health Development Agency, Prevention and reduction of accidental
injury in children and older people, (2003). Back
112
Department for Transport, Managing Speed on our Roads. Back
113
Hansard, (written answers, 10 Jan 2005 : Column 364W). Back
114
www.healthyschools.gov.uk Back
115
Brake Road Safety Week survey of 16,116 children aged 5-15, www.brake.org.uk Back
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