Between 2010 and 2011 there was a 3% increase in the number of people killed and a 2% increase in the number of people seriously injured on Britain’s roads. This is the first increase since 2003. This 3% increase in the number of people killed on Britain’s roads follows a 17% fall between 2009 and 2010, which was the largest percentage fall in a single year in the post-war period. The extreme winter of 2010 is thought to have contributed to this large fall and has been used as a way of explaining 2011 increases on the previous year. The 2011 figures, when compared with the 2005—9 baseline, still represent a 32% reduction on the number of people killed and a 15% reduction on the number of people seriously injured. This is against a background of reduced traffic levels, which are slowly starting to grow. Provisional figures for 2012 indicate that we can expect a year-on-year fall in the number of people killed (6%), but an increase in the number of people killed or seriously injured (1%) between 2011 and 2012. Based on the experience of Australia, this might indicate that extreme driver behaviours and system failures should be addressed to help reduce the casualty rate further. On average, road deaths across Europe fell by 3% between 2010 and 2011. However, the UK, as well as 12 other EU countries, reported road deaths above 2010 levels, including both Germany and the Netherlands — who, like the UK, have a history of good road safety performance. As with the UK, this diversion from past performance may be partly explained by the 2010 extreme winter weather in a number of countries. In absolute terms, the UK, along with Sweden, the Netherlands and Denmark, remain the four safest EU countries for road use. However, an analysis of the road safety management and plans of European countries ranks the UK within the bottom 25%, which suggests that the slowdown in road safety performance might also be related to systemic planning failures, rather than external factors alone such as the weather. It therefore remains important for the RAC Foundation and other similar organisations to monitor government performance on road safety, and to continue work to encourage the government to adopt proven road safety planning and performance measures. (Author/publisher)
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