A new report and ‘road safety dashboard’ published today by PACTS and Direct Line Car Insurance calculates the casualty rates for residents of each parliamentary constituency relative to the local population.
(Report Available here)
The Parliamentary Constituency Road Safety Dashboard, published in the run up to the General Election on 7 May, is intended to make it easier for MPs to see the road casualty picture in their constituency.
Using information from DfT STATS19 between 2008 and 2013, the Dashboard presents information on casualties for residents of the constituency, rather than looking only at collision locations.
The Dashboard also provides an analysis of progress over the last six years, comparing each constituency against the national average. The dashboard has now gone live, and is available to access HERE.
Separate analyses are provided by casualty severity, major road user casualty groups (pedestrians, motorcyclists and car users) and by age groups.
PACTS says the purpose of the Dashboard is to “provide additional specific local information to stimulate action to improve road safety for all road users”.
David Davies, executive director of PACTS, said: “Once the outcome of the General Election is known, the Government will consider its strategy for road safety.
“MPs have vital roles in promoting road safety – passing legislation, scrutinising the Government’s policies and representing the interests of their constituents. As the democratically elected representative for the constituency, an MP will often be the person to champion local road safety issues and to bring together the many public and private organisations involved.
“Good information is an essential basis for effective road safety actions and the UK has a long established and robust system for compiling road casualty data. This information, however, is rarely presented at Parliamentary constituency level. Indeed, until recently this was not technically possible. Instead, it is shown using local authority boundaries or other bases which rarely coincide with constituency boundaries. This makes it harder for an MP to see the overall picture for their constituency, to track local progress or to compare one constituency with another.
“To address this problem, PACTS commissioned Road Safety Analysis to create a set of online reports – one for each Parliamentary constituency – that present key information in a simple format at constituency level. The result is the Constituency Road Safety Dashboard.
“There will be many reasons why casualty rates and progress are higher or lower in certain constituencies. The figures provided here are not measures of performance. They are intended to highlight differences and to prompt questions about how progress can be made.”
If you would like a hard copy of the National Report, please contact admin.PACTS@pacts.org.uk with your contact details.
