Lies, Damned Lies and......

[Alice Cupra]

Don't you just love local journalism?

No idea where they get their statistics from, but they can sure dig them out from somewhere to back up their latest scare story / crusade.

Case in point? Huddersfield Daily Examiner.......

June 1st, 2006: "Good news as road deaths hit new low"
http://ichuddersfield.icnetwork.co.uk

Steve Thornton, chairman of the West Yorkshire Casualty Reduction Partnership, said: ".....lots of the usual soundbite stuff about why Scameras are brilliant.....

August 10th, 2006: "New test call as road deaths rise"
http://ichuddersfield.icnetwork.co.uk

Steve Thornton, chairman of the West Yorkshire Casualty Reduction Partnership, said: " "

Well, nothing actually, as they never thought to get the "Safety Camera" partnership to explain why road deaths have gone up when they tell us that Scameras save lives.....

And next, the Scamera Partnership tell us that they are shortly going to install "Safety Cameras" on a road (Huddersfield Road, Halifax)which has Statistics as follows (From their own site):

Year PICs KSIs
1998 14 3
1999 14 0
2000 6 1
2001 11 9
2002 9 0
2003 2 0
2004 3 0 (To August)

No doubt that, once installed, they'll be singing the praises of the new Scamera bringing down the casualty figures at a site which has already been steadily improving for the last 4 years anyway (About the same time that a Bus Lane was installed, if I remember correctly)

[vonhosen]

I think most drivers would rather have a GATSO than a bus lane.

[timsta]

vonhosen said:

I think most drivers would rather have a GATSO than a bus lane.

Nope, I'd rather have neither. Perhaps the money would be better spent elsewhere.

[telecat]

Haven't you seen my thread about a Camera they say they have but does not exist? The Gnome and crew have a web site and they have updated the stats recently. Most of the sites show no decrease in accidents and in fact they are increasing. Dishonest, discredited and deceitful, Welcome to the West Yorkshire Safety Camera Partnership.

[JoolzB]

vonhosen said:

I think most drivers would rather have a GATSO than a bus lane.

You're probably right but not both. If there are very few incidents, what's the point of adding something as distracting as a scam to the equation.

[autismuk]

Where do they get the statistics from ? They sit there with a pile of numbers, and play with them, manipulating data, until it produces the result they want.

Ever hear of a Scamera mob defining *in advance* the criteria for success or failure ?

[deva link]

Well they're two pretty different stories, to be fair.

However the second one is just plain wrong.

Huddersfield Daily Examiner said:

New test call as road deaths rise

Aug 10 2006

By The Huddersfield Daily Examiner


THE practical driving test has come under fire as road deaths continue to rise.

Road deaths are not continuing to rise, they're dropping:
2003: 3508
2004: 3221
2005: 3201

[hanse cronje]

depend how you view it

locally or nationally

locally cheshire's has risen

perhaps west yorkshire's has

nationally, there's been a bit of a fall

[Alice cupra]

hanse cronje said:

depend how you view it

locally or nationally

locally cheshire's has risen

perhaps west yorkshire's has

nationally, there's been a bit of a fall

From the first story ('Deaths down'), the opening to the article is:

"FEWER than 100 people died on West Yorkshire's roads last year - the lowest number since records began in 1974."

So if they are allegedly dropping nationally, where does this increase come from? And why wasn't this reported instead of the usual "Scameras are great" piece?

Odd.

[jasandjules]

They will just adjust the figures to get the answer they want anyways..

If deaths are on the up, simply adjust the deaths included to the area/road type/exact position on the street to get them coming down... No problems.

[bigandclever]

Quinny said:

So what's a serious injury?

'Fatal' injury includes only those cases where death occurs in less than 30 days as a result of the accident. 'Fatal' does not include death from natural causes or suicide.

Examples of 'Serious' injury are: Fracture; Internal injury; Severe cuts; Crushing; Burns (excluding friction burns); Concussion; Severe general shock requiring hospital treatment; Detention in hospital as an in-patient, either immediately or later; Injuries to casualties who die 30 or more days after the accident from injuries sustained in that accident.

Examples of 'Slight' injury are: Sprains, not necessarily requiring medical treatment; Neck whiplash injury; Bruises; Slight cuts; Slight shock requiring roadside attention. (Persons who are merely shaken and who have no other injury should not be included unless they receive or appear to need medical treatment).

[safespeed]

The serious injury statistics are discussed on: www.safespeed.org.uk/serious.html That was written in 2004 - I said the serious injury stats were drifting and unsuitable for year on year comparisons.

Recently the British Medical Journal published a paper about hospital admissions statistics confirming my analysis. According to the BMJ, hospitalisations resulting from road accidents have not fallen for TEN YEARS. The following Safe Speed PR has further details: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/SafeSpe

Edited by safespeed on Saturday 12th August 11:26

[safespeed]

Quinny said:

I can't see how my broken Scaifoid could be regarded as a "serious injury"

In my opinion this is just a minor injury. More of an inconvienience than anything else.

The serious injury definition was made in 1950 with a minor adjustment in 1953. Once these definitions have been made they become difficult and inconvenient to change, because we want to be able to use the figures for year to year comparisons.

I'm pretty sure that the serious injury definition was made deliberately to place serious injuries in the middle between slight and fatal as far as numbers were concerned, which is actually quite a smart thing to do.

slights outnumber serious injuries by roughly 10:1
serious injuries outnumber fatals also by roughly 10:1

It was always quite a nice system, until the practical application of the definition of 'serious' started to drift in the mid 1990s

[deva link]

Alice cupra said:

hanse cronje said:

depend how you view it

locally or nationally

locally cheshire's has risen

perhaps west yorkshire's has

nationally, there's been a bit of a fall

From the first story ('Deaths down'), the opening to the article is:

"FEWER than 100 people died on West Yorkshire's roads last year - the lowest number since records began in 1974."

So if they are allegedly dropping nationally, where does this increase come from? And why wasn't this reported instead of the usual "Scameras are great" piece?

Odd.

It's not just odd, the whole basis for the second story (that "road deaths continue to rise" is just plain wrong.

It's considered bad form for a newspaper to publish a story that is badly researched - if you live locally then you ought to write in and ask for a correction.

[justinp1]

vonhosen said:

I think most drivers would rather have a GATSO than a bus lane.

A quite brilliant retort!

In the face of overwhelming statistics and odds against, the ability to put a positive spin on things is amazing.

I see a bright future. When you move onto better things as some kind of goverment spokesman, will you still remember us on Pistonheads?

[streaky]

IIRC, the NHS rates injuries differently to the DfT.

Intersting that "concussion" is "serious" whereas "whiplash" is "slight". ANy long term effects are most likely to be the reverse.

Streaky