Safe Speed Forums

Can't find this news story on the web yet, here is the text of it:

So, will the government no longer be releasing deaths as a separate figure?

Thanks for posting that. I ran around in little circles and issued a PR at 13:35

PR252: Official figures are bunk

news: for immediate release

Government figures released today claim to show a 15% drop in killed and
seriously injured road accident victims comparing Q2 2005 with Q2 2004.

Safe Speed says this should set alarm bells ringing...

Paul Smith, founder of the Safe Speed road safety campaign
(www.safespeed.org.uk) said: "We know that our national road safety system is
huge with 230,000 miles of road, 32 million licence drivers and over 30
million registered motor vehicles. Big systems have plenty of inertia and
change only slowly. It is absurd to suggest that there has been a 15%
reduction in killed and seriously injured persons in 12 months. Changes cannot
normally take place that fast. We have excellent road crash statistics for
over 50 years to prove it."

"The only conclusion must be that something other than road safety is
influencing the figures. It could be reporting practice, data gathering
compiling or auditing, or it could be mainly because people are become
disaffected from the Police and are failing to report crashes."

"It is utterly absurd to suggest that road safety has changed that much in
such a short time."

"The serious injury statistics have been behaving strangely for some
considerable time, and are presently unsuitable for year on year comparisons."

<ends>


Notes for editors
=================

New DfT figures:
http://www.dft.gov.uk/stellent/groups/d ... 07488.hcsp

Safe Speed analysis of serious injury statistics:
http://www.safespeed.org.uk/serious.html
http://www.safespeed.org.uk/serious2.html

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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

I was wondering that too. Let's se the "K" part of the KSI - it's not so amenable to "redefinition".

_________________
"Politicians are the same the world over... We build bridges where there aren't any rivers." - Nikita Kruschev

We first get national road deaths figures in June. So in June 2006 we'll get 2005 figures for the first time.

This business of setting targets in KSI seems to be messing up the KSI figures. I'm begininning to suspect that it's no accident.

There's also some serious sloppyness or a change in the serious injury definition.

The definition on: http://www.dft.gov.uk/stellent/groups/d ... 07490.hcsp is:

"An injury for which a person is detained in hospital as an 'in-patient', or any of the following injuries: fractures, concussion, internal injuries, crushings, burns, severe cuts and lacerations, severe general shock and injuries causing death more than 30 days after the accident."

The long term definition is:

"An injury for which a person is detained in hospital as an “in-patient”, or any of the following injuries whether or not they are detained in hospital: fractures, concussion, internal injuries, crushings, burns (excluding friction burns), severe cuts and lacerations, severe general shock requiring medical treatment and injuries causing death 30 or more days after the accident."

Is this evidence of monkey business?

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

I don't think that's a fair comment whereas:



is more justifiable.

There either has been a change in KSI persons or not. The question is what conclusions (if any) can be drawn.

I know you have to get a point across but is it absolutely necessary to be quite so dogmatic ("utterly absurd", for example)?

I can't see any substantive difference. "whether or not they are detained in hospital" doesn't have any effect and the omission of the qualification "requiring medical treatment" to "severe general shock" would tend to increase the KSI count rather than reduce it (if there has been any actual change in the way it is assessed).

We're suddenly excluding the 30th day too.

Maybe, just maybe, the training and guidance given is also drifting the real-world use of the definition. Changing the definition even by a fraction (if indeed they have) is highly suspucious. It hasn't changed since about 1950. So why change it now?

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

I REALLY rushed that one out.

There is supposed to be 'something for everyone' there - a quote for the Times (etc), a quote for the Mail (etc) and a quote for the Sun (etc).

It's not my best, but I think it's OK. They like strong comments where possible.

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

Yeah I can see that's likely. I guess I have the lawyer's instinctive dislike of using unambiguous language where uncertainty may exist (case in point: note "where uncertainty may exist", not "where uncertainty exists"). I'd never make a journalist.

Tell me about it. My engineering background has exactly the same pressures to be detailed, precise and accurate. Fortunately I seem to have adapted to the 'sound bite' environment. A year or two ago it was bloody hard - I guess it feels just about normal now.

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

I can't see that making a difference either. It would bump up the 'K' figure rather than the 'SI' figure - so the total number would still be the same.

Or could it not just simply be because accidents are random and blips like this are to be expected?

The numbers are a bit big for that. 5% genuine reduction is possible (although I don't believe it's happening.) 5% random variation is certianly possible although not very probable. 15% overall is just unbeliveable.

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

wasn't there a lot less rain this year than last?


edit: no there wasn't... met office