Fatally Flawed UK Road “Safety” has degenerated into a Distortion, Intimidation, Extortion CashSuccessive Governments’ road safety strategy over at least the last three decades has been fatally flawed: predicated on the misapprehension that slavish speed limit adherence is the be-all-and-end-all of road safety. Nothing could be further from the truth. -grab.
Evidence-led policy-making i.e., examining the facts about accident causation, demonstrates that the three predominant Road Traffic Accident (RTA) causation factors (being present in upwards of three quarters of all RTAs) over this entire period are: Observation, Hazard Perception and Hazard Response failures: (1) “Failed to look”, (2) “Looked but did not see” and (3) “Failed to judge path or speed of converging road user”; with Illegal Speed at 5%; & other below speed limit (road user education and training) factors contributing the remainder (Fig.1).
Contributory factors to illegal speed fatal and serious injury accidents (Fig.2) exhibit a completely different profile of gross perceptual impairment (through drugs and/or alcohol) and/or outright sociopathic criminal behaviour as the primary precipitating factors reveal: “Aggressive driving”, “Stolen Cars”, “Drugs”, “Double White Trangression”, “Alcohol”, “Mobile Use” and “Inexperienced/ Unlicenced” (Fig.2).
The grossly perceptually impaired and criminally sociopathic are either completely oblivious to – or contemptuous of – any form of automated enforcement.
The illegal speed proportion of road traffic accidents and the associated causation factors have been removed from the 2023 & 2024 vehicle speed compliance statistics.
At the same time, the presentation of latest causation statistics has been misleadingly aggregated and transformed to attribute nearly 60% of causation to “Speed”; deliberately obscuring the minor (typically c.5.%) contribution of illegal speed to overall accident causation:
A PRIME EXAMPLE OF HOW TO LIE WITH STATISTICS.
The primary Observation Failure factors that precipitate the vast majority of RTAs are therefore going unaddressed to perpetuate the ‘Speed Kills’ Lie.
Despite constant reductions in speed limits and ever more aggressive enforcement, UK Road Safety has stagnated for over a decade (Figs.3 to 8). Prosecutions and Speed Awareness Course attendances have ballooned; weakly positively correlating (instead of a strong negative correlation if the current FAILING strategy were actually working) between these and casualty numbers: MORE prosecutions and Speed Awareness Course Attendances; accompanied by wholesale speed limit reductions and carpet-bombing the country with inappropriate wide-area 20mph limits, correlating with MORE casualties.
CLEARLY THIS ROAD ‘SAFETY’ MODEL IS FAILING – AND WORSE – FATALLY FLAWED.
Inappropriate Focus on DIE Is Actually Causing More Road Deaths and Injuries
The route to the resumption of improvements in UK Road Safety is to:
- Re-establish primary emphasis on Observation, Hazard Perception & Hazard Response (including countering Saccadic Masking) in accident prevention.
- Re-establish an enforcement régime founded on common-sense implementation of sensibly-set speed limits, based on Solomon Curve/ free-flow 85th Percentile speed measurements, and
- Create a fully independent, objective Road Accident Investigation and Prevention Branch (RAIPB), populated by ex Marine & Aviation accident investigation personnel (specifically excluding ‘Speed Kills’ obsessives) to control the currently completely unregulated, revenue-fixated speed enforcement industry.
The RAIPB would:
- Investigate and establish the primary causation factors in Death & Serious Injury Road Traffic Accidents (KSI RTAs)
- Formulate and enact policies (encompassing Education & Engineering solutions instead of exclusively Enforcement ones) that have been scientifically confirmed to most effectively reduce casualties.
- Set speed limits by road class on national basis using best practice (Solomon Curve & 85th Percentile Speed Principle as in ii above) road safety science.
- Monitor enforcement practices nationally (via ‘wildcat’ audits) to ensure effectiveness and consistency.
- The RAIPB’s own effectiveness to be measured SOLELY on casualty reduction achievements; not fine revenues or computer-modelled, allegedly speed reduction generated casualty reduction ESTIMATES.
So, how about abandoning the evidently ineffective ongoing enforcement blitz and instead focussing primary effort on addressing the Observation-Failure related precipitating factors that apply to 95% of road traffic accidents – THE PRIMARY, totally neglected, road user education & training issue!?
ENDS
Endnotes:
The DfT used to produce comprehensive casualty reports under the Road Accidents (subsequently Casualties) Great Britain banner. From the 1970s onwards until very recently; each one reported the proportion of road traffic accidents that had illegal speed (exceeding the speed limit) as one of the primary precipitating factors[i][ii]3,4. Typically, this proportion was well under 5%.
[i]“In 2016, for all accidents, 2.8% (5,517) of vehicles had an exceeding the speed limit contributory factor
allocated to them. This has remained stable over the past five years, with the value being 2.6% (5,645) in 2011.”
Source: Speed Compliance Statistics Great Britain 2017 – Page 15. https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/743878/vehicle-speed-compliance-statistics-2017.pdf
[ii]“In 2017, for all accidents, 2.8% (4,879) of vehicles had an exceeding the speed limit contributory factor allocated to them. This percentage has remained stable since 2014, although raw numbers have decreased, with the value being 2.5% (5,381) in 2014.”
Source:Speed Compliance Statistics Great Britain 2018 – Page 18. https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/812500/vehicle-speed-compliance-statistics-2018.pdf
3. “Exceeding the speed limit was reported as a contributory factor for 6.9% (3,927)of accidents in 2020, a decrease from 5.6% (4,1434) in 2019”.
Source:Speed Compliance Statistics Great Britain 2021 – Page 26. https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/vehicle-speed-compliance-statistics-for-great-britain-2021/vehicle-speed-compliance-statistics-for-great-britain-2021#speed-as-a-contributory-factor-in-road-accidents
4.“In 2021, for all collisions, 4% (4,980) of vehicles had an exceeding the speed limit contributory factor allocated to them. This percentage increased from 2014 until 2020, before decreasing slightly in 2021“.
Source:Speed Compliance Statistics Great Britain 2021 – Page 26:
https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/vehicle-speed-compliance-statistics-for-great-britain-2022/vehicle-speed-compliance-statistics-for-great-britain-2022#speed-as-a-contributory-factor-in-road-collisions
About the ABD:
Founded in 1992, the Alliance of British Drivers is the leading organisation promoting the interests and concerns of drivers in the United Kingdom.
The UK has over 37 million drivers – that is a majority; we should stop tolerating the way we are treated by the government and local councils.
Cars, vans and taxis account for 80% of the mileage of all trips in the UK, and over 65% of goods being carried by road. The road network, and the people who use it, are of vital importance to the nation’s economy.
Drivers should expect the road network to be improved and maintained to a standard that is fit for purpose. They should be able to use the roads in a safe and responsible manner without being subject to unreasonable charges, restrictions or penalties.
For all media enquiries, contact Paul Naylor on 07914 304 504 or email paul@mediaandyou.co.uk
