Safe Speed Forums

http://www.dft.gov.uk/stellent/groups/d ... 612594.pdf

Guess what? Speed camera policy is, err, in a bit of bother.

Read digest and comment please. I'll be on this one all day.

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Paul Smith
Our scrap speed cameras petition got over 28,000 sigs
The Safe Speed campaign demands a return to intelligent road safety

Safe Speed issued the following PR at 09:46:

PR366: Speeding isn't the killer. We have been lied to.

news: for immediate release

At 10am this morning the Department for Transport released vital
road safety information.

Only 4% of injury crashes involved exceeding a speed limit in 2005.

Paul Smith, founder of the Safe Speed road safety campaign
(www.safespeed.org.uk) said: "Safe Speed has been pointing out for years that the concentration on speeding was a deadly mistake. First the DfT said one
third of crashes
were caused by speeding. Then 12%. Now 4%. Our entire road safety policy has been based on dodgy data. Department for Transport has been defending bad
decisions and
bad policy for years. Now it MUST stop. Speed cameras MUST be scrapped. Heads MUST roll."

"We must put skills and attitudes at the heart of the road safety agenda."

"The skills that matter are in concentration, observation, anticipation, risk
recognition and risk management - not car control or legal compliance."

<ends>

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Paul Smith
Our scrap speed cameras petition got over 28,000 sigs
The Safe Speed campaign demands a return to intelligent road safety

It's nothing more than a total vindication of what you have been saying for several years. I notice they still try and hype up the role of speed by giving its own section, desperately clinging onto the speed kills philosophy.

The accidents due to speed may also be over stated as I am sure there were a few trafpols who said they were leant on to put speed as a factor when they didn't feel it truly was.

Speed doesn't kill...........


But The Truth Hurts!!

The first thing that strikes me is that throughout, they keep 'apologising' for the figures by reassuring the reader that speeding is very dangerous despite what the numbers show.

I notice that despite exceeding the posted limt being a contributory factor in 4% of incidents they lump it together with other things to come up with other things to come up with 28&, also they repeatedly bang on about exceeding the limit throught out the report!

They are desperate!

I have a new statistic, 100% of all accidents are caused by doing something*

*Includes sitlling still in a calm and quiet environment.

The headline read out on 5 live states that speeding is responsible for 15% of all KSIs or 28% of fatalities. Where are they getting this from?

They also seem to be cherry picking reductions (like the drink-driving reduction).

Didn't the actual fatality reducty amount to about 1% over last year?

This is the BBC, should they be a bit more independant than this.

The thing about reports are they are filled with raw data but the narrative and executive summary will express the opinion of the author and highlights the bits they want you to read. The BBC lap it up because it's lazy journalism.

And it fits their world view.

Table 2 clearly states that only 12 fatals were caused by exceeding the speed limit. Therefore 4.6% caused by exceeding the limit.

Strikes me that the wrong thing is being addressed here to bring down fatals.

Table 4 doesn't even include speed as a factor at all in pedestrian accidents but they still managed to generate table 7 showing speed as a contributary factor.

Wonderful bit of fudge on page 14:

"It should be noted that where a driver was exceeding the speed limit and travelling too fast for the conditions reporting officers are asked to report it as the former, however in a number of cases both factors are reported."

This shows that:

a) figures relating to exceeding the speed limit are in effect inflated

b) the and means that reporting officers (and the report itself) implicitly recognised that in some cases exceeding the speed limit was NOT travelling too fast for the conditions

c) compliance with speed limits per se is less important than not travelling too fast for the conditions.

It means that if I drive past a busy school at 29mph and flatten a child I am travelling too fast for the conditions, if I do the same at 32mph I'm exceeding the speed limit - disengenuous or what?

if the car involved was stolen is the accident listed as 'exceeding speed limit' or 'stolen car'??

Congratulations to SafeSpeed, well done Paul. As other posters have noted, this is what the campaign has been on about for ages.

This to me indicates that SafeSpeed is truly having an impact in the "real world".

Why do I say that it is SafeSpeed? Well, nothing scientific, but who else riding the steed of honesty, integrity, common-sense and spin-free information has got such a high profile in the UK road-safety world? Hint: "The Government" is the WRONG answer.
I don't reckon that this report would have taken this form if it wasn't for SafeSpeed.

SafeSpeed & Paul

Both.

_________________
Paul Smith
Our scrap speed cameras petition got over 28,000 sigs
The Safe Speed campaign demands a return to intelligent road safety

thus inflating the figures...

Page 10. table 3 contributoty factors by vehicle

Vehicles with no contributory factor 43%
so 57% are the fault of non-vehicles?

So if pedestrians wear bright clothing, are sober, dont mess about in the road and look before they cross then they (the govement) are able to half the accident stats!

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Speed limit sign radio interview. TV Snap Unhappy
“It has never been the rule in this country – I hope it never will be - that suspected criminal offences must automatically be the subject of prosecution” He added that there should be a prosecution: “wherever it appears that the offence or the circumstances of its commission is or are of such a character that a prosecution in respect thereof is required in the public interest”
This approach has been endorsed by Attorney General ever since 1951. CPS Code

Don't be rediculous! They're on foot! They can't possibly be responsible for an accident involving a motor vehicle...

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Science won over religion when they started installing lightning rods on churches.

I have said before in other threads, I would support jaywalking type legislation which has been implemented successfully in many other countries. It is time for the pedestrians to take responsibility for their own actions.

I remember my green cross code as it was drummed into us morning, noon and night, so I still stop, look and listen

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"Are you sh**ing me?"
"John Spartan, you are fined one credit for a violation of the verbal morality statute."

Just to get back OT, IMO yesterday was a bigger day for the campaign than the day they announced the 'end' of hypothecation.

The house of cards is tumbling Congrats to Paul for this.

(PS. I had a few colleagues pointing at the SafeSpeed sticker on the windscreen of my car yesterday, asking me what that was all about. My reply to them was 'watch the news tonight and you will find out' )