Driving Offences: Insurance
Mr Stewart Jackson: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what policies she is pursuing to reduce the incidence of uninsured vehicles on the road in (a) Cambridgeshire and (b) England and Wales; and if she will make a statement. [101383]
Mike Penning: The policies, which are not determined by county, to reduce uninsured driving are:
(a) Enforcing action against offenders who keep a vehicle without insurance, known as the continuous insurance enforcement scheme (CIE). This has been enforced since last June;
(b) Tackling fraud by working with the insurance industry to allow them access to DVLA driver details on penalty points and disqualifications.
The Government are also concerned that the rising cost of insurance may tempt motorists to drive uninsured and are working closely with the insurance industry on measures which will help reduce premiums. An industry summit was held on 14 February on the cost of insurance.
Driving Under Influence
Maria Eagle: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport pursuant to the written ministerial statement of 8 December 2011, Official Report, columns 56-8WS, on court notification of drink-drive offences, what progress she is making on her investigation into the sharing of data between the police, courts and the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency. [101469]
Mike Penning: Since my statement to the House, significant progress has been made in introducing safeguards to the data sharing arrangements between the police, courts and the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency.
These safeguards, which were introduced in December 2011, now prevent court notifications being processed for drink driving offences unless they contain a valid alcohol reading.
Substantial progress has also been made in identifying the drivers affected by the problem and arranging for them to undertake the necessary medical examination. Only a small number of cases remain outstanding.
Cycling: Safety
Caroline Lucas: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport if she will publish data on public perceptions of the safety of cycling in each local authority area. [102088]
Mike Penning: The Department for Transport sponsors a set of questions on the NatCen British Social Attitudes survey. This contains questions on people’s confidence about cycling on the roads and whether they believe it is too dangerous for them to cycle on the roads.
In 2011, this survey achieved interviews with 3,311 adults in Great Britain. This response is not large enough to produce robust statistical estimates at a local authority level. However, national results are available in the report at
http://assets.dft.gov.uk/statistics/releases/2011-british-social-attitudes-survey-attitudes-to-transport/bsa-2011-report.pdf
(pages 18-19) and in these tables
http://assets.dft.gov.uk/statistics/tables/att0321.xls
and
http://assets.dft.gov.uk/statistics/tables/att0322.xls
Results for the English regions, Scotland and Wales are presented in the following table. The relatively small sample sizes for these results means that many of the apparent differences are not statistically significant.
| Percentage | |||||||||||||
| North East | North West | Yorkshire and Humberside | East Midlands | West Midlands | SW | Eastern | Inner London | Outer London | South East | Wales | Scotland | Great Britain | |
|
How confident would you say you feel about cycling on the roads? |
|||||||||||||
|
Very confident |
9 |
9 |
9 |
12 |
8 |
11 |
21 |
12 |
9 |
11 |
13 |
5 |
10 |
|
Fairly confident |
20 |
21 |
23 |
20 |
22 |
23 |
22 |
26 |
25 |
13 |
21 |
19 |
21 |
|
Not very confident |
32 |
33 |
26 |
28 |
34 |
33 |
17 |
30 |
28 |
36 |
28 |
34 |
30 |
|
Not at all confident |
40 |
36 |
39 |
40 |
33 |
33 |
40 |
30 |
38 |
39 |
36 |
41 |
37 |
|
Don’t know |
— |
— |
3 |
1 |
3 |
— |
— |
2 |
0 |
1 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
|
‘It is too dangerous for me to cycle on the roads’ |
|||||||||||||
|
Agree strongly |
31 |
31 |
30 |
27 |
31 |
25 |
36 |
22 |
28 |
32 |
24 |
37 |
30 |
|
Agree |
34 |
32 |
29 |
36 |
33 |
31 |
23 |
35 |
32 |
33 |
32 |
30 |
32 |
|
Neither agree nor disagree |
12 |
14 |
17 |
16 |
16 |
17 |
11 |
16 |
14 |
11 |
17 |
15 |
15 |
|
Disagree |
18 |
18 |
18 |
19 |
15 |
22 |
22 |
17 |
24 |
19 |
23 |
15 |
19 |
|
Disagree strongly |
4 |
5 |
3 |
1 |
3 |
4 |
7 |
8 |
2 |
5 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
|
Don’t know |
— |
— |
2 |
1 |
2 |
— |
— |
2 |
— |
— |
1 |
— |
1 |
|
Proportion of cyclists(1) |
26 |
28 |
24 |
31 |
31 |
38 |
29 |
25 |
37 |
33 |
28 |
29 |
31 |
|
Number of responses |
165 |
414 |
261 |
272 |
321 |
353 |
133 |
210 |
453 |
277 |
179 |
273 |
3,311 |
‘— ’Indicates value is negligible (less than half the final digit presented) (1) Has access to a bicycle and cycled at least once in the previous 12 months Source: NatCen British Social Attitudes survey, 2011
Caroline Lucas: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what steps she is taking to encourage non-London local authorities and the Highways Agency to identify and prioritise junctions where cycle safety improvements are most needed. [102089]
Mike Penning: We take the issue of cycle safety very seriously.
The Department for Transport collects data on all personal injury road accidents reported to the police. Data on all individual accidents in the years 2005-10 is available to download at
http://data.gov.uk/dataset/road-accidents-safety-data
Data for 2011 will be uploaded in late summer. These data are used widely by local authorities across Great Britain to target safety improvement work on the roads they manage. Departmental officials are also currently analysing the data to identify areas where high numbers of cycling accidents have occurred.
I, along with my colleague the Minister for Cycling, the hon. Member for Lewes (Norman Baker), have recently written to all local highway authorities in England explaining what the Government are doing on cycling and cycle safety and also what action they could consider taking in their areas. Furthermore, the safety sub-group of the Cycling Stakeholder Forum, which brings together government, cycling groups and local authority representatives has already started looking into the issue of road sharing.
Vehicles: Lorries
Question
Asked by Lord Bradshaw
To ask Her Majesty’s Government, further to the Written Answer by Earl Attlee on 8 June 2010 (WA 33), how the new measures on lorry mirrors to improve the visibility of cyclists and pedestrians have been implemented.[HL16588]
Earl Attlee: The new measures referred to in the earlier answer were implemented in two phases.
All new lorries over 3500kg were required to comply with Directive 2003/97/EC from 26 January 2007 and this was implemented by SI 2005 No. 3165: The Road Vehicles (Construction and Use) Amendment)(No.4) Regulations 2005.
http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2005/3165/contents/made.
Subsequently, additional requirements for mirrors were introduced for existing lorries registered from 1 January 2000. These requirements were contained in Directive 2007/38/EC and implemented into UK law
by SI 2009 No. 142: The Road Vehicles (Construction and Use) (Amendment) Regulations 2009. They entered into force on 31 March 2009.
http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2009/142/contents/made.
Mirrors are checked as part of the annual roadworthiness inspection for goods vehicles
Vehicles: Automatic Number Plate Recognition
Question
Asked by Lord Bradshaw
To ask Her Majesty’s Government, further to the Written Answer by Earl Attlee on 8 March (WA 447), whether automatic number plate recognition cameras may be used by local authorities, police and local communities to enforce 20 miles per hour speed limits, or whether this requires permission from central government.[HL16413]
The Minister of State, Home Office (Lord Henley): Use of cameras to assist enforcement of any speed limit does not require central government permission. Evidence from the cameras is only admissible in court if the device is of a type approved for that purpose by the Secretary of State.
