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grok_mctanys) wrote2022-02-21 08:54 pm
grok_mctanys) wrote2022-02-21 08:54 pm
Living with traffic accidents caused by speeding
The House of Commons, 21 February 2022†, The Prime Minister (Boris Johnson):
With permission, Mr Speaker, I will make a statement on our strategy for living with traffic accidents caused by speeding.
It is a reminder that speeding has not gone away but, because of the efforts we have made as a country over the past eight decades, we can now deal with it in a very different way by moving from Government restrictions to personal responsibility, so that we protect ourselves without losing our liberties, and by maintaining our contingency capabilities so that we can respond rapidly to any major incident caused by speeding.
The UK was the first country in the world to require seat-belts, and the first European nation to protect half its population with driver-side airbags. Having made the decision to refocus our Highways Agency back in the '80s on the campaign to "clunk, click, every trip", we were the first major European nation to require crumple zones, too. And it is because of the extraordinary success of this vehicle safety programme that we have been able to lift our restrictions earlier than other comparable countries—opening throttles up last summer while others remained closed, and keeping throttles open this winter when others shut down again—making us one of the most open economies and societies in Europe, with the fastest cars anywhere in the G7 last year.
While deaths from speeding are not over, we have now passed the peak of the traffic accident wave, with cases falling, hospitalisations in England now fewer than 10,000 and still falling, and the link between crashing and severe injury substantially weakened. Over 71% of all drivers in England now own NCAP 3-star or better rated vehicles, including 93% of those aged 70 or over. Together with the treatments and scientific understanding of the physics of traffic accidents we have built up, we now have sufficient levels of protection to complete the transition from protecting people with Government interventions to relying on safety features and medical treatments as our first line of defence.
As we have throughout the past eight decades, we will continue to work closely with the devolved Administrations as they decide how to take forward their own plans. Today’s strategy shows how we will structure our approach in England around four principles.
First, we will remove all remaining domestic restrictions in law. From this Thursday, 24 February, we will end the legal requirement to adhere to posted speed limits, and so we will also end speeding-related fines. We will end routine GATSO speed camera checks. Until 1 April, we will still advise people who feel nervous about driving quickly to stick to the old limits, but after that we will encourage people to just exercise personal responsibility, just as we encourage people who leave karaoke bars drunk late at night to be considerate to others.
It is only because levels of protection are so high and deaths are now, if anything, below where we would normally expect for this time of year that we can lift these restrictions. And it is only because we know accidents are less severe that enforcing speed limits on the colossal scale we have been doing is much less important and much less valuable in preventing serious injury. We should be proud that the UK has established the biggest vehicle safety programme of any large country in the world.
From today, we are removing the guidance for drivers to rigorously follow the highway code. The Government will also expire all provisions in the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984. Of the original 147, 75 have already expired and 55 will expire on 24 March. The last seventeen, relating to control and enforcement, will expire six months later, when they will no longer be necessary.
Secondly, we will continue to protect the most vulnerable with softer bumpers and bonnets. The UK is leading the way on pedestrian focussed safety measures, with our Ramblers Taskforce securing a supply of volunteers for collision testing, which is more per head than any other country in Europe.
Thirdly, the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies advises that there is considerable uncertainty about the future path of the accidents caused by speeding, and there may of course be significant resurgences. SAGE is certain that there will be higher-speed variants, and it is very possible that those will be worse than current accidents. So we will maintain our resilience to manage and respond to those risks, including our world-leading Office for National Statistics survey, which will allow us to continue tracking accidents in granular detail, with regional and age breakdowns helping us to spot surges as and where they happen. And our laboratory networks will help us understand the evolution of accidents and identify any changes in characteristics.
We will prepare and maintain our capabilities to ramp up incident responses. We will continue to support other countries in developing their own surveillance capabilities, because a new accident can occur anywhere.
In all circumstances, our aim will be to manage and respond to future risks through more routine vehicle safety interventions, with medical interventions as the first line of defence.
Fourthly, we will build on the innovation that has defined the best of our response to traffic accidents. The safety taskforce will continue to ensure that the UK has access to effective safety standards as they become available, and has already secured contracts with manufacturers trialling Automatic Emergency Braking, which would provide protection against speed-related accidents. The therapeutics taskforce will continue to support seven national priority clinical trial platforms focused on treatments for accident-related injuries. We are refreshing our security strategy to protect the UK against the potential for deliberate vehicular-based threats emanating from state and non-state actors.
Traffic accidents will not suddenly disappear, so those who would wait for a total end to this war before lifting the remaining regulations would be restricting the liberties of the British people for a long time to come. This Government do not believe that that is right or necessary. Restrictions take a heavy toll on our economy, our society, our mental wellbeing and the life chances of our children, and we do not need to pay that cost any longer. We have a population that is protected by the biggest vehicle safety programme in our history; we have the airbags, the treatments and the scientific understanding of how accidents happen; and we have the capabilities to respond rapidly to any major incident on the road.
It is time that we got our confidence back. We do not need laws to compel people to be considerate to others. We can rely on our sense of responsibility towards one another, providing practical advice in the knowledge that people will follow it to avoid injuring loved ones and others. So let us learn to live with accidents caused by speeding and continue protecting ourselves without restricting our freedoms. In that spirit, I commend this statement to the House.
(original statement)
† In a timeline even stupider than our current one. Maybe. But, given that deaths from traffic accidents are an order of magnitude less than those from Covid, maybe not.
With permission, Mr Speaker, I will make a statement on our strategy for living with traffic accidents caused by speeding.
It is a reminder that speeding has not gone away but, because of the efforts we have made as a country over the past eight decades, we can now deal with it in a very different way by moving from Government restrictions to personal responsibility, so that we protect ourselves without losing our liberties, and by maintaining our contingency capabilities so that we can respond rapidly to any major incident caused by speeding.
The UK was the first country in the world to require seat-belts, and the first European nation to protect half its population with driver-side airbags. Having made the decision to refocus our Highways Agency back in the '80s on the campaign to "clunk, click, every trip", we were the first major European nation to require crumple zones, too. And it is because of the extraordinary success of this vehicle safety programme that we have been able to lift our restrictions earlier than other comparable countries—opening throttles up last summer while others remained closed, and keeping throttles open this winter when others shut down again—making us one of the most open economies and societies in Europe, with the fastest cars anywhere in the G7 last year.
While deaths from speeding are not over, we have now passed the peak of the traffic accident wave, with cases falling, hospitalisations in England now fewer than 10,000 and still falling, and the link between crashing and severe injury substantially weakened. Over 71% of all drivers in England now own NCAP 3-star or better rated vehicles, including 93% of those aged 70 or over. Together with the treatments and scientific understanding of the physics of traffic accidents we have built up, we now have sufficient levels of protection to complete the transition from protecting people with Government interventions to relying on safety features and medical treatments as our first line of defence.
As we have throughout the past eight decades, we will continue to work closely with the devolved Administrations as they decide how to take forward their own plans. Today’s strategy shows how we will structure our approach in England around four principles.
First, we will remove all remaining domestic restrictions in law. From this Thursday, 24 February, we will end the legal requirement to adhere to posted speed limits, and so we will also end speeding-related fines. We will end routine GATSO speed camera checks. Until 1 April, we will still advise people who feel nervous about driving quickly to stick to the old limits, but after that we will encourage people to just exercise personal responsibility, just as we encourage people who leave karaoke bars drunk late at night to be considerate to others.
It is only because levels of protection are so high and deaths are now, if anything, below where we would normally expect for this time of year that we can lift these restrictions. And it is only because we know accidents are less severe that enforcing speed limits on the colossal scale we have been doing is much less important and much less valuable in preventing serious injury. We should be proud that the UK has established the biggest vehicle safety programme of any large country in the world.
From today, we are removing the guidance for drivers to rigorously follow the highway code. The Government will also expire all provisions in the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984. Of the original 147, 75 have already expired and 55 will expire on 24 March. The last seventeen, relating to control and enforcement, will expire six months later, when they will no longer be necessary.
Secondly, we will continue to protect the most vulnerable with softer bumpers and bonnets. The UK is leading the way on pedestrian focussed safety measures, with our Ramblers Taskforce securing a supply of volunteers for collision testing, which is more per head than any other country in Europe.
Thirdly, the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies advises that there is considerable uncertainty about the future path of the accidents caused by speeding, and there may of course be significant resurgences. SAGE is certain that there will be higher-speed variants, and it is very possible that those will be worse than current accidents. So we will maintain our resilience to manage and respond to those risks, including our world-leading Office for National Statistics survey, which will allow us to continue tracking accidents in granular detail, with regional and age breakdowns helping us to spot surges as and where they happen. And our laboratory networks will help us understand the evolution of accidents and identify any changes in characteristics.
We will prepare and maintain our capabilities to ramp up incident responses. We will continue to support other countries in developing their own surveillance capabilities, because a new accident can occur anywhere.
In all circumstances, our aim will be to manage and respond to future risks through more routine vehicle safety interventions, with medical interventions as the first line of defence.
Fourthly, we will build on the innovation that has defined the best of our response to traffic accidents. The safety taskforce will continue to ensure that the UK has access to effective safety standards as they become available, and has already secured contracts with manufacturers trialling Automatic Emergency Braking, which would provide protection against speed-related accidents. The therapeutics taskforce will continue to support seven national priority clinical trial platforms focused on treatments for accident-related injuries. We are refreshing our security strategy to protect the UK against the potential for deliberate vehicular-based threats emanating from state and non-state actors.
Traffic accidents will not suddenly disappear, so those who would wait for a total end to this war before lifting the remaining regulations would be restricting the liberties of the British people for a long time to come. This Government do not believe that that is right or necessary. Restrictions take a heavy toll on our economy, our society, our mental wellbeing and the life chances of our children, and we do not need to pay that cost any longer. We have a population that is protected by the biggest vehicle safety programme in our history; we have the airbags, the treatments and the scientific understanding of how accidents happen; and we have the capabilities to respond rapidly to any major incident on the road.
It is time that we got our confidence back. We do not need laws to compel people to be considerate to others. We can rely on our sense of responsibility towards one another, providing practical advice in the knowledge that people will follow it to avoid injuring loved ones and others. So let us learn to live with accidents caused by speeding and continue protecting ourselves without restricting our freedoms. In that spirit, I commend this statement to the House.
(original statement)
† In a timeline even stupider than our current one. Maybe. But, given that deaths from traffic accidents are an order of magnitude less than those from Covid, maybe not.
no subject
No one major difference is road accidents have v a limited R#, where R also stands for rubbernecking.
no subject
The only reason 90% of our laws even exist is to compel people to be considerate to others! Murder - very inconsiderate to others. Theft, fraud, assault, drunk and disorderly - all very inconsiderate behaviours. Even things like negligent homicide where the crime is accidental can often be down to the person not properly considering the likely consequences of their actions.
How does someone who becomes Prime Minister not understand what laws are for? FFS!
no subject
no subject
no subject
But the times it didn't occur to him to be considerate? Why would he remember those occasions at all?
So, remembering times he was considerate to others, but not even being aware of the times he was inconsiderate, would mean he probably does think of himself as a considerate person.