Safe Speed Forums

Firstly, apologies if Brake have been discussed before but i thought it would be nice to see some current views and opinions about this "road safety" organisation, particularly because of their recent outrage to the proposed reduction in penalty points to minor speed limit violations and also because they 'urgently' want ALL urban limits to 20mph.

So, what are your views and opinions on Brake?

Do they have a point?

Are their strategies likely to improve road safety, or merely produce a nation of deskilled, speedometer-watching snails?

From what I've seen of the Brake campaign they are a group of bereaved people who believe that because they've lost a close member of their family to a road accident they are road safety experts.

I actually took the time to read some of the site a while back. Once you strip away the 'speed kills' tosh there's a reasonable amount of fairly sensible information. Unfortunately they don't seem too keen to back up any of their 'beliefs' with fact. The example in my experience being as follows:

There is a section on the site about motorcycling and advice to riders on safety issues. One thing that is stated is that you should always wear body armour. I've never used body armour and from what I understand wearing it can actually cause more damage in a crash than not. I emailed Brake to air my views and am yet to receive a reply some 4 weeks later.

I think alot of what they say is rubbish, but unfortunately, as we've said here before, the authorities and general public seem to think that because these people have been bereaved then their opinion somehow counts for more than the rest of us. I think its just another case of 'whoever shouts loudest gets their way'

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

Brake are vehemently against any raising of the motorway speed limit. Anyone who uses a motorway knows this stance is utterly irrational, hence I would conclude their members don’t drive on motorways. I don’t know any driver who doesn’t use motorways, hence I conclude their members don’t drive – car haters!

During the 1990s, official road safety was gradually changing out of all recognition. The 'speed kills' thing was being more and more widely accepted, and was largely unopposed.

By about 2000 the 'infection' was pretty close to complete, and still no one had put up any credible opposition.

Members of 'the road safety club' were patting each other on the back and telling themselves that everything that went wrong on the road was the fault of the driver.

One simple mistake in looking at the big road safety picture makes it all possible. If you look at crashes, and fail to look at how crashes are avoided, the conclusions are even more or less reasonable. (Of course there are other false assumptions too. See: http://www.safespeed.org.uk/conspiracy.html )

Brake are centre-stage in the road safety club. Other members of the club tell them all day long that drivers are terrible and must be curbed.

The thing that I simply cannot get my head around is the 'la la la; I'm not listening' part. I've written. I've telephoned. I've emailled. I've offered meetings and presentations. But they ignore everything. You would think that anyone genuine in road safety would want to explore All ideas. All options. All opinions.

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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

Brake definately seem to put forward an emotonal agruement rather than a logical one; their spokesperson on the news recently confirmed this to me. They don't appear to have any qualms about exploiting road death victims and their famillies to strengthen their dubious message that speed kills, such as comments similar to <<try telling that to the familly of 'X' who was recently killed by 'Y' in a crash that raising the speed limit is a good idea>> (not an actual quote but a similar style to the ones they use)

Do users recall the outrage caused by the terrible stabbing of the special constable outside her home? There was a massive outcry by some pressure groups to increase the penalty for carrying a knife to a mandatory 20 years. I don't think this would have any effect of knife crime however lots of people disagree and think it would reduce crime.

Do brake operate in a similar way to this: ie harsh penalties, reactionary, but little care or regard for the actual cause?

I now am coming around to the possibility that they are merely anticar. What Paul has said about ignoring his correspondance can only reinforce this.

I have every sympathy for those have lost loved ones in a road accident, or ideed through any cirumstances. However bereaved relatives often don't look at things rationally, and who can blame them? However that doesn't mean to say that their solution is the most appropriate one, or that their views count for more - they are not road safety experts and we must remember that. They have a understandable desire that "somthing must be done". However it takes someone who is emotionally unattached to rationally look at the causes of accidents. However it is often very diffiucult to argue with someone who has lost a loved one without appearing cruel and uncaring.

In my opinion they are only anti-car in the sense that they want to see traffic levels reduced in that belief that that will cut accidents.

There are quite a few similar organsations, and the media often use them to counter arguments because they know however good the opposing argument is, they have the "moral high ground". eg:

Presenter: In the studio we have [Person] from [Road Safety Organsiation] whose [partner|son|daughter] was killed in a road crash last year, and on the line we have the press officer from [motoring organsation]. Mr Press Officer, what do you say to [Person] about your organisation's opposition to reducing the speed limits in [Town] when it might have saved their [partner|son|daughter]?

As others have said I think they are mainly just an anticar group posing under the facade of a road safety organisation.

If this was not the case then they would have been more than happy to meet Paul or any one else interested in road safety that also was pro-car.

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It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his job depends on not understanding it.

Upton Sinclair

Maybe the reason they won't meet with Paul, is that they're scared they might have to listen to common sense, and be prepared to have a lot of what they say deep sixed.

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Semper in excreta, nur quantitat variat.

Yeah. But the thousands of dead children can't speak at all anymore. Let's
hope thier parents carry on, not for thier own sake (you can't bring them
back) but for ours.

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I stole this .sig

Maybe they are suspicious of you. Maybe they wonder exactly why you’re
making out you’re a road safety saint, as if you’re personally involved?

They wonder why you are determined to save a few lawbreakers from
getting their punishment, while their world is falling apart? Most of all,
they think you’d be MUCH better off joining the Samaritans and saving
people that way, leaving the road safety stuff to the professionals and the
cops, instead of stirring up trouble with “mondeo-man” on the Internet.

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I stole this .sig

Believe me basingmate.. I have been there.. a member (now ex) of Brake. These people have revenge and raw emotion in common. I admit that when I nearly lost Wildy.. and when we lost her cousin.. that emotion and pain were at "white heat levels" and "searing". You do not know what it feels like .. no more than Paul. We do .. that's why I think we are better equipped to speak out.

I cannot ever ever describe the anger I felt over a request ot use photos of Wildy's car and the injuries as part of an anti-speed campaign. It was not speed .. even though that car struck my wife's car in excess of 80 mph. Guy was taken ill.



We are talking about the insanity of replacing cops with automation and no advice or training to improve skills.

We are talking of road deaths remaining static and even increasing in some areas as a result of this automation and no attempt to improve a standard.

We are talking of hospital A&E stats and original police stats making one heck of a wound caused by a dropped suture in road safety policies by showing the true sorry picture of a failed road safety policy ;... which leaves thousands more cyclists and other road users as SI and a higher than ever toll for cyclist Ks.




Perhaps that's the way forward for BRAKE and ROADPEACE as they do a lot to help victims cope with bereavement. The real danger is that they encouraage brooding and blaming.. whilst nothing is done to help the traaumatised person whose mistake caused the incident. All are victims .. and all need help to cope with the trauma of accident.

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If you want to get to heaven - you have to raise a little hell!

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They are just like the flu
We use our smilies on YOU today
Now Good Causes are smiling too!

KEEP SMILING
It makes folk wonder just what you REALLY got up to last night!

Smily to penny.. penny to pound
safespeed prospers-smiles all round! !
But the real message? SMILE.. GO ON ! DO IT! and the world will smile with you!
Enjoy life! You only have the one bite at it.

You mean, like the professionals and cops who frequent these very forums? Implying that we're all just a bunch of repmobile drivers with no real sense of what makes roads safer for all, is quite wide of the mark methinks.

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Chris

Mad Moggie - I salute you!!!!!!!!

Absolutely TOP post!

I feel there's really nothing more to be said!

Mad Moggie

Second your comments, when I lost my fiance (several years ago) I was approached, both her and her friend were killed as a result of the lorry driver being drunk, he was within the limit but put a mini between a HGV and a reinforced concrete bridge post and even within the speed limit the results are lethal.

The Judge gave a minimum sentance as the driver had not been speeding, he seemed to have lost the point that the driver being drunk had killed.

Looking back I'm not sure what angered me the most the fact that the person I spoke to from Brake wanted to use her death as part of an 'anti speed' campaign despite speed not being a factor (as in over the posted limit) or that the judge 'congratulated' the drunk driver for managing to kill whilst staying within the speed limit.

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Gordon Brown saying I got the country into it's current economic mess so I'll get us out of it is the same as Bomber Harris nipping over to Dresden and offering to repair a few windows.

Chaos, panic and disorder - my work here is done.

http://www.wildcrafts.co.uk

In my mind, Brake do have some good advice and tips for drivers. But a lot of the time they really do come across too much as "a voice for victims of accidents" and then appear as a "something must be done/someone must be seen to have done something" group.

A good example has got to be the drink drive limit. For most people the current limit is fine. The real problem is lack of enforcement of the existing law meaning that there are motorists who risk it on 2 or more pints in the knowledge that that chances of being stopped for a breath test are tiny. Reducing the limit is just not going to do anything.

And 10mph speed limits outside schools? Blimey. Again, an overkill proposal which they use the "if you hit a child at 20/30/40" argument to justify it. The real issue is awareness of hazards (in this case, usually children) and anticipation of what they might do.

:rotfl: oh how you've just made me chuckle! You need to take a trip to my area - we don't have road safety professionals - we have muppets who needlessly restrict traffic flow, wind drivers up and no plod

Where do you get road safety professionals from? Send some our way...

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Pecunia Prius Equitas et Salus

Typical example in our local rag today. Calls for a lower speed limit on a section of NSL road where a lad killed himself recently. By all accounts, the lad was doing over 80 on the NSL road when he "fell off" but obviously, had the limit been 40, he wouldn't have dreamt of doing 80 along it!

Yeah, right.



At times, I really dispair!

I'm still looking for a anti-car organisation with the bottle to set up a real-time open-to-all forum.

Transport 2000's "message board" is a heavily censored joke, and Brake want you to join the "fleet safety forum"....yeah right.

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"Show me someone who says that they have never exceeded a speed limit, and I'll show you a liar, or a menace." (Austin Williams - Director, Transport Research Group)

Any views expressed in this post are personal opinions and may not represent the views of Safe Speed