The Department of Transport's (DfT) recent revelations of road casualty statistics have gone some way towards removing what little public confidence remained in the speed camera programme and Department for Transport road safety policy, according to road safety campaign Safe Speed. It's because "all their data is dodgy", said the campaign.
Safe Speed has tackled the DfT's claims head-on:
Serious injury data
DfT claims massive improvements in road safety based in substantial declines in serious injuries and KSI over a decade or so. Safe Speed pointed out in 2004 that the serious injury stats were behaving strangely and unsuitable for year-on-year comparisons. In 2006, the British Medical Journal and the Statistics Commission agreed. Hospitalisation data shows not improvement over a decade.
20 30 40 message
The DfT rightly says that at 30mph 20 per cent are killed. But only 0.47 per cent of child pedestrians hit by cars are killed. Impact speed and 'free travelling speed' are on average wildly different, according to Safe Speed, which said it has been pointing this out since 2002.
Crash reductions at speed camera sites
Such claims are massively dominated by a statistical error called regression to the mean. Safe Speed has been pointing this out since 2002. Appendix H of the '4th year report' of the speed camera programme finally admits that it is a huge effect, but DfT excludes any adjustment from its headline claims.
One-third of crashes are caused by speeding
The truth came out on Thursday. It isn't 'one third', it's five per cent. They aren't 'caused by speeding' - instead they are crashes where speeding may be a contributory factor. We say 'may be' because recorded along with the contributory factor data is a 'confidence rating'. The DfT has ignored the confidence rating -- with no reason given.
Founder of Safe Speed Paul Smith said: "All the claims that DfT has been using to support the speed camera programme are 'dodgy'. The entire project is founded on false assumption and dodgy statistics. The DfT has completely failed to consider side effects -- of which there are many. This is an extraordinary story of 'systematic failure' of a government department with institutional false beliefs. It has found dodgy data and used it to mislead the public about their own effectiveness. As a result thousands have died on our road who would have lived if we had sound road safety policies.
"DfT is institutionally unable to understand the process of safe driving and is not fit for purpose. Their policies are wildly wrong and have caused great damage to UK road safety. Speed cameras must be scrapped. Department for Transport must be restructured.
"Road safety depends on it."
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