Cooking the Books
It's nothing new, it's the same old thing that has got Ted going, but he needs to get it off his chest...
Angry, bloody angry. That was me yesterday. I thought I’d exceeded my quota of anger when it comes to speed cameras and then the Government published their report into speed cameras.
Made me bloody angry it did. As can be expected these days most media outlets reported the ‘facts’ with the sensationalist headlines provided by the Government. “100 lives saved”, “Deaths down 40%” etc, etc, bloody etc.
Then in the House of Commons Tony Blair told us that speed cameras now save 800 lives a year! It beggars belief how ill-informed he is. I was so angry about that, I couldn’t bring myself to write an article about it!
Open Goal
The media took great delight in Tony and George not finding weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. The whole issue built up to a point where the press delighted in pointing the finger and exposing the lies that the public were told to justify the Government’s actions.
Yet here we are with the most transparent set of data ever and few journalists could be bothered to look beyond the headlines and fatuous quotes from Captain Darling. Makes me bloody angry you know.
The spreadsheets available on the Department for Transport’s website show how desperate the Government are to prove the case for cameras. Not for one moment am I suggesting that there aren’t cameras that are well placed and serving a useful purpose but the ‘evidence’ put forward to justify the majority is fanciful at best. ‘Statistical’ evidence in some way endorsed by the University College of London can be picked apart by anyone with a CSE in woodwork.
Naeively we thought we might get “Deaths 3 years before camera placement” versus “Deaths 3 years after camera placement”.
Instead in some cases we were presented with deaths in the last three months versus the average deaths per quarter for a three year period. No deaths in the last three months? 100% improvement. The “43%” improvement in Thames Valley could be spotted as cherry picked data by a Romanian fruit picker.
Luckily the farce has seen some anti-camera groups get some coverage in the media. Representatives from the ABD have been given lots of air time this week which can only be a good thing. What angers me though is that the only argument interviewers seem to come up with is that if you’re anti-camera then you want to ‘speed’ and put children’s lives in danger.
Hypocrisy
Firstly I don’t believe for a moment that all pro-camera motorists observe the speed limit 100% of the time. The accusations of ‘law breaker’ are constantly thrown at motorists complaining about speed cameras, yet I suspect the level of hypocrisy we see here is immeasurable.
And what finally takes me to the edge of bursting point is the assumption that in some way I don’t care about safety because I’m anti-speed camera. DON’T BE STUPID! I’m so bloody angry because I do care about safety and yet thousands of people and millions of pounds are wasted enforcing a policy that is having almost no effect whatsoever.
Where are cameras catching lorry drivers on the phone? Where are cameras catching drivers incapable of pulling out of a junction without driving into another car? Where are cameras catching drivers showing off to their mates? Where are cameras catching the inept, the incompetent and the downright ignorant motorists who shouldn’t be allowed on our roads? Where are the cameras catching people not wearing seatbelts? Where are the cameras catching people too tired too drive? Where are the cameras catching the increasing number of drink drivers?
No one will ever succeed at making everyone drive at 20mph in case they crash so perhaps we should stop people crashing…
800 people haven’t been spared, deaths aren’t down 40%. The death rate on our roads has been stagnant since cameras were introduced. The obsession with speed is resulting in deaths and the Government is too pig headed to admit that it’s pursuing the wrong policy. People are dying every day on our roads and we’re doing nothing about it.
While Rome Burns
Every day that Darling wastes cooking the books sees more people die on our roads. That’s not what I expect of a transport minister that’s supposed to represent the interests of the people of this country.
Bin the binary law enforcement and apply some common sense. Robocop ain’t up to the job...
I totally agree about the point on where are cameras to catch people on the phone. I still see lots of people using their mobiles driving down the middle of narrow twisty B roads obviously not in total control of their car, surely they are the most dangerous ones.
I caught an article on the local TV news recently, showing a group of cute kids standing in the road smiling to camera, while the presenter babbled on about how they would all be dead if it wasn't for speed cameras. Made me sick.
My hat off to you sir....
wedgepilot said:
Spot on Ted, I'm also amazed by the media reaction to this - are they simply too scared of the 'think of the children-ists' to probe a little deeper into these 'stats'?
I caught an article on the local TV news recently, showing a group of cute kids standing in the road smiling to camera, while the presenter babbled on about how they would all be dead if it wasn't for speed cameras. Made me sick.
Er - presenter not heard on Green Cross and Highway Code - especially rules 4 and rule 7?
Application and media focus and road safety prat focus on those two paragraphs alone would save far more lives than any speed camera.
As for the rest of the superb article - echo our JMGS4 -
There are certainly plenty of hypocrites out there, who no doubt break speed limits much more [often] than they would ever dare to admit - even to themselves. Don't necessarily mean that they are driving dangerously at the time though.
How about the copper caught speeding on the M6 Toll Road? He claimed to be driving safely, and I can well believe it. He did seem to get off somewhat more lightly than the 'average' person caught speeding, but that's a different topic.
Then there was the person (a pensioner, I believe) in Aldershot/Farnborough who got fined *and banned* for a personal effort to slow down cars with a view to reducing possible accidents. Actually guilty of preventing an officer in collecting revenue from otherwise unsuspecting drivers - nothing to do with safety.
The URL statistics are clearly 'cherry picked' to come up with some positive results - although I saw little comment on the actual amount of revenue raised by the scameras, which is pretty much criminal in itself (especially as the money does not then go into any sort of safety schemes).
The PH-type view is a lot of the 'well, they would say that' sort of approach, which we are all entitled to hold. The scamera proponents can (and do) use the same sort of response to our comments, but added to that they are now putting in more emotive terms ('blood on your hands') as is the wont of the current politico bunch. Emotion needs to be removed from some of these comments, to stress the *facts*, which Ted has tried (well) to highlight - even though anger is clearly a problem for anyone trying to answer these fatuous claims and misuse of statistical data.
I think one of the more important issues is not just the strongly-biased report being used, but the complete misinterpretation and propogation of figures from that report by our absolutely wonderful leader (vomit). Hence one more reason why Ted, and the rest of us here, are so angry, I would guess.
We can only argue so much that the cameras are a fund-raising mechanism, because the fact is that speed limits are law and if you are caught breaking that law, then you are liable to be fined for the offence.
But the bullsh!t about the cameras helping safety and saving lifes should be clearly seen as wrong.
If the authorities want to improve safety, there are any number of measures they could take which would almost certainly achieve better results in lives saved and accidents reduced. But they would cost money, from the Govt, so will not be paid for. Whereas it is obviously just fine (no pun intended) to take more and more money from road users (albeit when they are caught breaking a law of some sort) and feed that back into some other money-making machine. Scamera partnerships do seem to have some very high running costs, according to figures in that report. How come? Who really gets the money that they extort/raise?
'Nuff said, methinks
Ev_ said:
Sometimes I wonder, though, are Darling and Blair and co. actually "in" on the stats fiddling, or have they just been suckered into it in the same way that the general public are?
Either way, it's inexcusable.
When you lie about something so often you believe it's true, then you'll lie to defend it to the last. Politicians have so much at stake when they're found out to be liars that they'd rather continue pig-headed and tell everyone else they're wrong than own up and (rightfully) lose their job.
Bliar's already up to his ears in it with the Iraq war and WMDs, and sucking up to Bush who thinks Saddam is a member of Al-Qaeda, that one more lie will kill him off.
1- In the '70, the number of death on the UK roads and the French roads was roughly the same (more than 15000 a year).
2- UK adopted an agressive politic and put speed cam everywhere. In 2002 the number of UK road death was 3431.
3- France didn't do that, and in 2002 the number of FR road death was 7250 (twice as much)...
4- In 2003, the French gov decided to use speed cams, and the number of death drops from 7250 (2002) to 5732 (2003).
5- In 2004, this number is still decreasing, but it's interesting to note that this number is not expected to drop far below 5000...
So, speed cam are working (or at least seems), but they won't do everything...
M.
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