Watch out There S a Kid About

Watch Out There’s A Kid About! policy agenda

WATCH OUT THERE’S A KID ABOUT! IS A NATIONAL CAMPAIGN FOR CHILD ROAD SAFETY, COORDINATED BY BRAKE, THE ROAD SAFETY CHARITY, WITH A WIDE BASE OF SUPPORT FROM OTHER AGENCIES.

Why the campaign?

Traffic is one of the biggest killers of children and young people. Young people are far more likely to be killed on the road than older people, meaning road deaths are often a tragic waste of young life.

Almost two-thirds (62%) of all so-called ‘accidental’ deaths of 5-14 year olds happen on the road – many more than in fires, or by drowning, poisoning or falls1.

In total, 75 children under 16 were killed and 2,017 were seriously injured on foot and 31 were killed and 485 seriously injured on bikes in the UK in 20062. That’s 217 a month, or 50 a week.

In fact, traffic is the biggest killer of 15-24 year-olds, and the third biggest killer of children aged 5-14, after cancer and diseases of the nervous system1. Deaths and injuries shoot up at the age when parents have to – despite their great fears – allow their children to walk and cycle unaccompanied, often with their peers.

In fact, 61% of children killed or seriously injured in 2006 were on foot at the time2. Although child pedestrian deaths have fallen significantly since the mid-1990s, the UK’s child pedestrian death rate is still fifth worst in a list of 15 Western European countries* published by the Department for Transport, three times higher than Norway and Sweden, and twice as high as France and Denmark. (*Figures for Italy and Luxembourg are not available.)3

Many deaths and serious injuries of children occur in built-up areas at speeds that many drivers are prepared to travel at - a driver doing 35mph in a 30mph zone is almost twice as likely to kill a pedestrian s/he hits than if they were sticking to the limit4 Yet a fifth of car and van drivers (both 19%) and a quarter of motorcyclists (25%) break 30mph limits by that amount or more5.

We want to stop these appalling tragedies. Now. It’s a vicious circle. More families using their cars to ferry children to and from different places means more traffic, including many large four wheel drive vehicles, known as ‘Chelsea Tractors’, often with bull bars on the front. It’s no surprise that it’s the most disadvantaged children, from families without cars, living in deprived inner-city areas, who are most likely to die on foot.6

Surveys by Brake show that kids are not only at risk. They7, their parents8, and teachers7 are also scared by traffic, which influences families to use their cars for the ‘school run’ and other journeys, rather than risk the healthier option of walking or cycling to prevent obesity (which isn’t healthy if it results in death or injury).

FACT: At 20mph, a pedestrian who is hit has a 95% survival chance. At 40mph, the statistic is nearly reversed – they have an 85% chance of being killed4.

FACT: Most children on foot and bikes who die are secondary school age1. They are old enough to need, and want, to walk and cycle on their own. But young enough to make mistakes when using roads, such as stepping into the road while chatting to a friend.

FACT: The faster we drive, the less time we have to react9 to a child stepping into the road, the harder we hit, AND THE GREATER THE PROBABILITY THE CHILD WILL DIE.

We need to give our children a chance by having safer environments outside homes, schools and where children routinely travel between the two. Even if a child makes a mistake when walking or cycling, they don’t deserve a death sentence.

1 Deaths by age, sex and underlying cause, 2006 registrations (Office of National Statistics, 2007) 2 Road Casualties Great Britain 2006: Annual report, table 34 (Department for Transport, 2007), and figures obtained from the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI), 2007 3 Road Casualties Great Britain 2006: Annual report, table 51 (Department for Transport, 2007) 4 Some characteristics of the population who suffer trauma as pedestrians when hit by cars and some resulting implications (Ashton and Mackay, 1979) 5 Road statistics 2006: traffic, speeds and congestion, Transport Statistics Bulletin (Department for Transport, 2007) 6 Streets ahead - safe and liveable streets for children ( Institute of Public Policy Research, 2002) 7 Brake’s survey of 5-15 year olds for Road Safety Week 2007 (Brake, 2007) 8 The Green Flag Report on Safe Driving 2004 part four: A Risky Business, (Brake, 2006) 9 The Highway Code (The Stationery Office, 2007) We want safer roads and safer drivers. Drivers have a responsibility to remember that a child might run out, and drive slowly around houses and schools. We don’t believe there is a majority motorist lobby opposed to this – most motorists also walk around their communities, and many are also parents, deeply concerned about their children’s safety on roads.

We are calling on the Government to take simple steps, which we believe would result in MAJOR STRIDES towards achieving its target of a 50% reduction in child deaths and serious injuries on our roads by 2010 (compared with the mid ‘90s). 10

INTERNATIONAL LESSONS FOR THE UK A report published by the Department for Transport in 2004 identified many of the steps Brake is calling for in this policy agenda as best practice policies on child road safety from around the world. The report outlined recommended measures already implemented by most countries on child pedestrian safety, which included: promoting pedestrian education and training initiatives in most areas; compulsory road safety education; and regional publicity aimed at child pedestrian safety.

The countries with the best records on child pedestrian safety – Sweden, the Netherlands, Finland, Germany and Denmark – tended to implement extra policies relating to child pedestrian safety, including: speed reduction measures in most local authorities and outside many schools; safe play areas, such as parks and playgrounds in most residential areas; national publicity campaigns at least once a year on child pedestrian safety; and legislation that assumes driver responsibility for crashes involving child pedestrians in residential areas.

The report called for urgent action by the UK Government to set low speed limits near schools and school curriculum topics on safe travel, and to learn from innovative policies in other countries that could be readily transferred to the UK. 11

What needs to happen?

Step 1: We need safety zones around children’s schools, children’s homes and the routes between the two!

We want ring-fenced funding for specially-designed ‘safety zones’ to help drivers remember their responsibilities on housing estates, narrow residential roads in cities or villages (which sometimes don’t even have pavements) and outside schools, so families feel safe leaving their own front doors and school gates on foot or bikes.

A safety zone means 20mph limits (or even lower on roads such as residential cul-de-sacs), high-visibility warning signs and road markings/coloured tarmac, speed cameras and physical measures if necessary (such as road narrowings or humps) which have been proven repeatedly to radically reduce casualties and make our residential and school streets more pleasant, family-friendly places.12

NOBEL ROAD HOME ZONE Nobel Road in Clifton, Nottingham, an estate with about 600 homes, was approved as a Government pilot ‘Home Zone’ in 1999. Following extensive consultation with local residents, including local children, tackling speeding was identified as a top priority. Traffic-calming features to reduce vehicle speeds to 20mph and reinforce pedestrian road crossing points have already been introduced, and further changes to road layout are now planned to further reduce speed13.

Home Zones are very common in countries like the Netherlands, where over 6,500 have been introduced since the late 1960’s14, but a rarity here. The Department for Transport established nine pilot Home Zones, including Nobel Road, in 1999 and is directly funding just 61 more ‘Home Zones’ from a one-off funding scheme, the 2001 ‘Home Zone Challenge’15.

There are thousands of communities crying out for Home Zones all over the UK – 237 communities submitted bids when the Home Zone Challenge was launched by the Government in 2001. It was only able to fund 61 of them16.

10 Tomorrow’s roads – safer for everyone: the Government’s road safety strategy and casualty reduction targets for 2010 (Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions, 2000) 11 Children’s Traffic Safety: International Lessons for the UK, Road Safety Research Report No 50 (Department for Transport, 2004) 12 Home Zones – Planning and Design Transport Advisory Leaflet 10/01 (DTLR, 2001); 20mph speed limits and zones Traffic Advisory Leaflet 09/99 (DETR, 1999); and others 13 www.homezonenews.org.uk, home zones in the UK section (Department for Transport, 2004) 14 www.homezonenews.org.uk, frequently asked questions section (Department for Transport, 2004) 15 Tomorrow’s roads – safer for everyone – the first three year review (Department for Transport, 2004) 16 www.homezonenews.org.uk, news section (Department of Transport, Local Government and the Regions, 2004) At the moment, many communities can’t get speed cameras outside their schools because of a Department for Transport regulation saying four people must have been killed or seriously injured at the site in three years before a camera may be installed17. Others are told by their local council that there is simply no money available for important traffic-calming measures.

It’s an outrage that worried mums and dads should have to be told this.

20MPH SUCCESS STORIES HULL – there are 118 20mph zones in Hull, which cover a quarter (25%) of the city’s road network, including two ‘Home Zones’. The council has also invested more than £2.5million in the city’s cycle network since 1997. Each year, 1,500 children receive pedestrian training and 48 of the 91 schools in Hull have ‘safe routes to school’ measures in place, with plans for all schools to have these measures by 2010.18 EDINBURGH – in 2007/08 three further 20mph zones are being constructed in residential areas, bringing the total number in the city to 38. Areas with high rates of pedestrian and cyclist casualties have been prioritised. In addition, the Scottish Government has provided specific funding to the council for spending on 20mph speed limits at schools. Almost all Edinburgh primary schools now have 20mph limits around school entrances and in their local area. Since 2005, when the 20mph zone building programme began, child pedestrian casualties in Edinburgh have fallen from 119 in 2004 to 83 in 2006. 19

We want safer ‘mixed priority routes’ – routes that kids use between their homes and schools and other important buildings that they need to visit such as libraries, shops or sports centres. A mixed priority route is the technical term for a road that drivers use to get from A to B, but which pedestrians also walk alongside or cross frequently to reach facilities such as schools, shops or sports centres20 The Department for Transport is currently piloting ten Mixed Priority Route Demonstration schemes, to look at ways of making mixed priority routes safer. It is currently monitoring and evaluating the schemes with the view to forming a good practice guide for local authorities in December 2007.21

To stop kids dying on these routes we need better pavements, cycle paths, barriers between traffic and people, and more Pelican or Puffin crossings. Crossings should react quickly to pedestrians when they ‘press the button’ rather than having slow reaction times that encourage people to ‘chance it’ before the green man appears.22 The green man should stay green for more than a few seconds – it needs to be green long enough to allow vulnerable people to get across the road – and drivers should have clear warning signs that a crossing is ahead.

CAMPAIGNING COMMUNITY Children walking to Treleigh Primary School in Redruth, Cornwall, have to cross the A3047, a busy 60mph road used by three industrial estates. The school lollipop lady risks her life on a daily basis to stop fast-moving traffic so the children can cross. Parents are desperate for measures recommended by a county council surveyor in 2005 to be implemented. The Council says that the cost of installing railings, a pedestrian crossing and part-time speed limits, operating at the beginning and end of the school day, is prohibitive.

Sadly, in many cases in the UK, safety zones around schools, homes and on ‘mixed priority’ routes are currently only being piloted in a few areas, leaving many parents furious and despairing at the dangers their children face.

We demand that safety zones on these roads are rolled out across the UK to protect ALL children on their journeys to and from school and around their homes when they are out and about. What are we waiting for? Another child to die?

We want an annual nationwide survey of roads by Local Authorities, to be published by the Department for Transport, identifying school roads, access roads outside people’s homes, and mixed priority roads that are commonly used by children as well as traffic and the speed limits, road signs and traffic calming measures on these roads.

In line with Government recommendations, every Local Authority should also immediately carry out ‘child safety audits’ including surveys of how children travel to school and the risk faced on existing access and mixed priority roads. These audits should act as a catalyst for measures to make children’s journeys safer, such as the introduction of ‘safety zones’ and ‘school travel plans’ identifying the safest travel modes and routes for children. Sometimes a school travel plan can result in safety schemes such as ‘walking buses’ when children walk to school hand in hand, in a ‘crocodile’, with volunteer parents supervising.

Safety audits should not just identify roads where deaths have already happened – a dangerous road may have had no fatalities on it because people are too scared to walk and cycle. Communities should not have to wait until the worst happens before they can get safety zones.

SOUTH GLOUCESTERSHIRE CHILD SAFETY AUDIT

17 Handbook of Rules and Guidance for the National Safety Camera Programme for England and Wales for 2005/06 (Department for Transport, 2004) 18 Chapter 5: Shared Priority – Safer Roads’, Local Transport Plan 2006-2011 (Hull City Council, 2006) 19 www.edinburgh20zones.co.uk 20 Tomorrow’s Roads – safer for everyone – The first three year review, point 171 (Department for Transport, 2004) 21 Child Road Safety Strategy 2007 (Department for Transport, 2007) 22 The installation of Puffin pedestrian crossings Traffic Advisory Leaflet 01/02 (DTLR,2002); Pedestrian Crossing – assessment and design TRA 06/95 (Department for Transport,1995) In 2003, South Gloucestershire Council carried out a Child Road Safety Audit, in line with the Government’s road safety strategy. The Department for Transport (DfT) had asked all local authorities to carry out child road safety audits in their local areas with the aim of identifying child road safety problems, to enable them to implement strategies and contribute information about successful measures to the MOLASSES (Monitoring Of Local Authority Safety Schemes) database.

DfT suggests that the Child Safety Audits should provide opportunities to analyse data about the location and severity of child road deaths and injuries, the road user type, age and sex and other relevant information, such as the number of school crossing patrol sites, the number of 20mph zones, or estimates of the total numbers of children walking and cycling to school. Careful analysis of this data can identify key groups to be targeted - for example, child car passengers or teenage male cyclists. In some authorities, analysis at ward level, or another geographical area, can also point out links between casualties and social deprivation. They should also include information on plans for action, such as plans to increase the number of 20mph zones; plans to improve pedestrian and cycle networks for children; and policies to introduce 10 or 20mph maximum speed limits in residential areas23.

After analysing casualty data, South Gloucestershire Council decided to prioritise visits of its School Travel Plan Coordinator to schools in urban areas where child pedestrian and cyclist casualties are highest. It is also focussing its cycle training course for secondary school pupils in these areas. It ran a high-profile road safety campaign, involving partners in all the emergency services, the Safety Camera Partnership, Social Services, Youth Workers and the NHS in the Kings Chase electoral ward in March 2004. This electoral ward was identified as the most disadvantaged in South Gloucestershire, with a high child pedestrian casualty rate24.

We demand intelligent analysis of casualty statistics by all local authorities, with effective action to re-design all casualty blackspots and other locations where the risk of a child being killed or injured is high AS WELL AS campaigns to educate the most vulnerable groups of road users.

STEP 2: Education, education, education

We want compulsory, effective, road safety education for children of all ages, as part of the National Curriculum. The burden of responsibility for children’s safety should always be on drivers, who are adults in charge of vehicles that can kill. But we must teach our children to be as safe as possible when using roads.

Road safety education is possible within the ‘safety and citizenship’ curriculum, but is not compulsory and often not taught, despite the availability of lots of teaching resources from the Department for Transport and other agencies. It must be.

ROAD SAFETY EDUCATION IN SCOTLAND A report by the Scottish Executive in 2000 concluded that road safety education should be a clear part of an overall programme of personal safety education, within each school. While road safety skills and knowledge can be reinforced using a cross-curricular approach, the research found there is also a need for it to be taught in its own right as a discrete subject.

The report identified a recommended set of learning objectives for different stages of pupils’ development. These included: Primary years 1-3: ensuring children are aware of the potential dangers of road use; developing self and spatial awareness of the child as pedestrian; demonstrating a basic understanding of main information sources for pedestrians; understanding the characteristics of safe travel as a passenger; being able to travel to and from school independently either as a pedestrian or on school transport; demonstrating acceptable behaviour as a pedestrian or public transport user. Primary year 7 – Secondary year 2: making longer complex journey with minimal supervision but with assistance in planning; describing how to travel safely to and from secondary school; being able to plan and make longer complex journeys using a combination of transport modes on an unaccompanied basis. Secondary years 3-6: Recognising the dangers of 'non-conforming' behaviour in the context of road use; appreciating the effects of drugs and alcohol on road users; describing the characteristics of good driving behaviour; appreciating the psychological aspects of 'speed', reckless behaviour, alcohol and how these are portrayed in media stereotypes. 25

Until road safety is an integral part of the National Curriculum, it will never be a priority for schools – until a disaster happens. Why doesn’t the biggest ‘accidental’ killer of school-age children get automatic classroom time?

23 Guidance on local authority road safety audits, on website www.dft.gov.uk (Department for Transport, 2003) 24 Child road safety for South Gloucestershire, on www.southglos.gov.uk (South Gloucestershire Council, 2003) 25 Road Safety Education in the Scottish Curriculum, Development Department Research Findings No 78 (Scottish Executive, 2000) We want pre-school children to get free membership of the Children’s Traffic Club (this educational initiative is already provided by Government to parents in Scotland and Wales, who get a pack of road safety information including story books)26. All nurseries should have to teach road safety.

CHILDREN’S TRAFFIC CLUB IN SCOTLAND Since 1995, a road safety education scheme known as the Children’s Traffic Club has been free to all three year olds in Scotland. On becoming a member of the Club, children receive six books at three-monthly intervals, with stories and activities to teach road safety, as well as a membership certificate and stickers. Notes for parents on how to use the books are also included27. Packs are also available free to nurseries and playgroups in Scotland through local road safety units.

Funding for free membership of the Club was initially funded by the Scottish Office, and is now funded by the Scottish Executive. Invitations to join the Club are sent out by the Health Board around a child’s third birthday and take-up rate is currently around 55% (i.e. 27,000 new members per year). It is estimated that around three-quarters of nurseries in the country have received the packs and about half of these are using them with their children28.

We want all primary school children to get practical, roadside pedestrian skills training, such as the training that was delivered by Local Authority road safety officers and volunteer parents through the Department for Transport’s three-year pilot ‘Kerbcraft’ scheme29. The Government is currently evaluating the effectiveness of the scheme, which ended in 2007. Results will be disseminated to local authorities in late 2007, early 2008, to encourage them to continue running Kerbcraft training, or similar, without Government funding. It isn’t enough to just teach children in the classroom and at the moment not all Local Authorities can afford to offer practical pedestrian training to children in all schools.

We want 11-16 year olds to have hard-hitting classroom lessons about the dangers of traffic, the effect of road crashes and the importance of using roads safely on foot and bicycles. It should be compulsory to teach these vital messages alongside sex and drug education in PSHE lessons.

We want all lower secondary children who own a bike – almost nine out of every ten children30 – to get free, practical, on-road cycle training of a high standard through their Local Authority.

We want Government-funded year-round media campaigns aimed at children and drivers, on the importance of child pedestrian safety and cycling safety and the dangers of speed. At the moment, they are intermittent.

We demand that the Government proves it is truly committed to reducing the number of child deaths and injuries on our roads, by stumping up the cash for hard-hitting, prime-time TV and radio ads that run all year round.

Step 3: Kids should stand out from the crowd

We want kids to be bright at night, as the evenings get darker in the autumn, particularly rural kids walking on dark village lanes and city kids walking around roads with lots of traffic. As they won’t wear ‘high-viz’ clothes that aren’t trendy, we want clothing manufacturers to design coats and bags for kids with plenty of fluorescent and reflective strips, not just tiny designer patches. 31

BRIGHT KIDS IN FINLAND Research from Finland strongly supports children carrying reflective discs when out and about. Finnish casualty statistics were analysed following high-profile government campaigns from 1998 to 2000 to promote reflective discs to children. In that time, child pedestrian casualties halved, from 0.93 deaths per 100,000 child pedestrians (aged 0-14) in 1997 to 0.5 deaths per 100,000 child pedestrians in 200032. In 2003, Finland introduced legislation requiring all pedestrians to wear reflective materials in the dark on lit and unlit roads33

26 www.trafficclub.co.uk (2004). In many areas of the UK, the Club works in partnership with local and health authorities, who automatically contact parents around their child’s third birthday. Several authorities provide free or subsidised membership for the three-year-olds in their area 27 www.srsc.org.uk (Scottish Road Safety Campaign, 2004) 28 Evaluation of the Children's Traffic Club in Scotland: New Nursery and Playgroup Pack, (Scottish Executive, 2003) 29 www.kerbcraft.org.uk (MVA, 2005) 30 Case study: Bikes for all, Leicester www.capacity.org.uk (Capacity, 2007) 31 Look Up – a report on vulnerable road users and conspicuity clothing (Brake, 2002) 32 Research by the Central Organisation for Traffic Safety in Finland, referenced on website www.scanglo.co.uk 33 Children’s Road Traffic Safety: An International Survey of Policy and Practice, Road Safety Research Report No 47 (Department for Transport, 2004) We want the Government to insist on free high-viz school bags for every primary and secondary school-age child, provided by their Local Authority for them to carry their school books in, ensuring a level of visibility of every child.

We want the Government to insist on free visi-vests for every primary and secondary school age child who wants to cycle to school, provided by their Local Authority, which should also provide a secure lock-up place for their bike at school.

Parents shouldn’t have to choose between maximising the visibility of their kids on the road and minimising their chances of getting bullied for their lack of fashion sense. If high-viz bags and clothes are part of the required school uniform, kids will be more visible to drivers, but won’t stick out like a sore thumb among their peers.

We want bright yellow school buses – updated versions of the classic US-style school bus – that are brightly-coloured and have a sign that tells drivers to ‘stop’, to replace the school buses which currently carry our children. School buses in the UK are often old vehicles, which not only have no seat belts, but are often so full that children have to stand up, or share three to a seat.

YELLOW BUSES IN THE UK In 2003, the Department for Transport (DfT) provided £18.7 million to set up a three-year pilot scheme of 150 US-style school buses in West Yorkshire, serving 300 schools. Yellow buses are also run by bus operators in Runnymede and Wrexham. The buses only carry schoolchildren, have seatbelts, drive directly to schools and have specifically trained drivers. Evaluations of the DfT-funded pilots showed they had helped cut car journeys to and from schools and reduce school gate congestion. For example, 64% of passengers on the yellow buses running in Hebden Bridge were former car passengers, equating to 25,000 fewer car journeys to schools per year and reducing school gate congestion by 15%. However, at the end of 2006, the DfT announced no more funding was available and that it would not extend the scheme to other areas of the country34.

Parents are often horrified at the state of school buses - no wonder that so many of them choose to drive their kids to school. We demand school buses that are safe, fit-for-purpose and easily-recognised by other road users. Our kids deserve no less.

We want lighter evenings in winter, to improve visibility when kids are walking home from school, the time of day when road casualties of school-age children peak. Once the clocks go back in October, our winter evenings start very early – meaning children are walking home from school in the dark, and so are less visible to motorists. Every autumn, when the clocks go back and sunset occurs earlier, road casualties and casualty rates rise. In 2006, 58 pedestrians were killed in November and 91 in December, compared with an average of 52 per month from April-October35.

The Government should introduce Single/Double Summertime (SDST) in the UK. This would put us one hour ahead of Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) in winter and two hours ahead in summer. A 1998 report commissioned by the Government concluded that adopting SDST would result in 450 fewer deaths and serious injuries, including between 104 and 138 fewer deaths36. It would be particularly effective in reducing the number of child pedestrians and cyclists killed or injured on the roads, as it would be lighter for longer in the afternoon, particularly at the time when kids are walking and cycling home from school. Mornings would be darker if this change was made; but as children tend to go straight to school in the morning, they are less exposed to road risk than on their journey home, when they are likely to make stops.

DAYLIGHT SAVING WOULD EQUAL LIFE SAVING IN THE US The US Insurance Institute for Highway Safety has carried out research showing that extending daylight saving time year-round can help prevent pedestrian deaths and injuries. Analysing 1987-91 data on the six hour periods around sunrise and sunset from the federal Fatality Analysis Reporting System, researchers confirmed that the number of fatal crashes was closely linked to changes in daylight. During daylight saving time, which adds an hour of daylight to the evening, there were fewer fatal crashes. They estimated that about 900 fatal crashes -- 727 involving pedestrians and 174 involving vehicle occupants -- could have been avoided during the study period if daylight saving time had been in effect throughout the year37.

Step 4: Vehicles should give kids a fighting chance

We want pedestrian-friendly vehicles. This means running comprehensive tests to assess the protection vehicles offer to vulnerable road users in the event of a crash and requiring all manufacturers – not just the ones who achieve good ratings – to publish the results in their marketing materials to allow consumers to make informed choices.

34 Hansard - 20 July 2006 : Column 680W 35 Road Casualties Great Britain 2006: Annual Report, table 28 (Department for Transport, 2007) 36 Broughton, J; and Stone, M. A New Assessment of the Likely Effects on Road Accidents of Adopting SDST, TRL report 368 (TRL, 1998). 37 Ferguson, S.A.; Preusser, D.F.; Lund, A.K.; Zador, P.L.; and Ulmer, R.G. “Daylight saving time and motor vehicle crashes: the reduction in pedestrian and vehicle occupant fatalities”, American Journal of Public Health 85(1); 92-95 (US Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, 1995) PEDESTRIAN-FRIENDLY VEHICLE TESTING Since 1997, the European New Car Assessment Programme (EuroNCAP) has carried out a series of crash tests on all new makes and models of car to replicate crashes with child and adult pedestrians at 40kph (25mph), with the aim of encouraging manufacturers to start designing for pedestrian protection.

The tests, designed by the European Enhanced Vehicle safety Committee (EEVC), assess the likely impact of an adult pedestrian’s leg, upper leg and head and a child pedestrian’s head at different points on the front of each car, including the bumper, bonnet, windscreen and mirrors. Each test is given a rating of fair, weak or poor protection, which translates to a ‘star’ rating for each car.

EuroNCAP tests are designed to provide information for car manufacturers and their customers. They do not provide any compulsory minimum standard of pedestrian protection in car design for industry38.

We want high minimum pedestrian safety standards for vehicle manufacturers. All new vehicles should meet the high pedestrian safety standards set by four tough tests, developed over more than 20 years of research by the European Enhanced Vehicle safety Committee (EEVC)39. At present these standards are not due to be introduced until 1 September 2010 and are subject to a feasibility study. Instead, the European Commission has introduced a Directive requiring vehicles to comply with two tests developed by the European Commission Joint Research Centre40, which offer up to 70% less protection against fatal injury for a pedestrian than the EEVC standards and only apply to new types of vehicle. The European Commission should issue a Directive for member states to require all new vehicles to meet the EEVC standards.

CITROËN PEDESTRIAN PROTECTION To date, only one car has received the maximum four-star rating from EuroNCAP for pedestrian protection – the Citroën C6. The C6 features an ‘active’ bonnet, which pops up in a collision with a pedestrian to absorb energy and help prevent injury.

On Euro NCAP’s website in November 2007, 114 of the 279 cars tested (41%) had received no stars for pedestrian protection41.

Manufacturers should be legally, as well as morally, obliged to give kids on foot and bicycles a fighting chance by designing vehicles that do less damage to them in the event of a crash. The technology exists – why should we accept any less?

Step 5: Child killers must be locked away

We want drivers to be automatically responsible for any crash involving a child pedestrian or cyclist under civil law. Research commissioned by the Department for Transport found that countries with the lowest child pedestrian fatality rates already have this legislation in place42.

We also want drivers to be automatically responsible for any crash involving a child pedestrian or cyclist under criminal law. This would mean that if a vehicle is proven to have killed or seriously injured a child, unless the child deliberately threw themselves under the vehicle, the driver is automatically charged with ‘killing or seriously injuring a child while driving’, with a wide range of penalties available. This charge would be able to be brought whether or not there was any evidence of careless or dangerous driving – careless or dangerous driving which be aggravating factors resulting in tougher penalties.

AUTOMATIC RESPONSIBILITY FOR DRIVERS IN THE NETHERLANDS In 1988, the Dutch Supreme Court ruled that children under 14 could not be expected to observe the rules of the road in a case where a 13-year-old cyclist was seriously injured by a car when she cycled out of a side road into the path of a car, which had priority at the junction. The driver was ordered to pay all damages and costs.

According to the Dutch Ministry of Transport43, the legal precedent established by this case has had a psychological effect in making drivers more aware of the vulnerability of children. If they see a ball bounce into the road they now have to assume that a

38 www.euroncap.com (European New Car Assessment Programme, 2004) 39 ETSC’s response on the European Commission’s proposal relating to the protection of pedestrians and other vulnerable road users in the event of a collision with a motor vehicle, on website www.etsc.be (European Transport Safety Council, 2003) 40 Proposal for a Directive of the European Parliament and of the Council relating to the protection of pedestrians and other vulnerable road users in the even of a collision with a motor vehicle and amending Directive 70/156/EEC, on website europa.eu.int/eur-lex/en/com/pdf/2003/com2003_0067en01.pdf (European Commission, 2003) 41 EuroNCAP, www.euroncap.com 42 Christie, N; Towner, E; Cairns, S; Ward, H. Children’s Road Traffic Safety: An International Survey of Policy and Practice – Road Safety Research Report No. 47 (Department for Transport, 2004) 43 Quoted in an article by Ben Webster (The Times, 11.09.2004) child will run out after it. If a driver hits a child, practically the only legally-acceptable excuse is that the child voluntarily threw itself under the car.

While there were initial protests about the ruling by some Dutch drivers, the Ministry of Transport says that it is now widely accepted that drivers need an extra burden because of their powerful position in traffic. Dutch policymakers are now debating whether to extend the law to children aged over 14.

In a 2004 international comparison of child road safety, the two countries surveyed which had the best child pedestrian safety records – Sweden and the Netherlands – had both passed legislation giving automatic responsibility under civil law to a driver hitting a child pedestrian. Only seven of the total number of 21 countries surveyed had this type of legislation42.

However carefully we teach our children road safety skills, we cannot expect them never to make a mistake when walking or cycling. We demand that drivers assume automatic responsibility for the safety of the child pedestrians and cyclists around them, so they are not put at a legal disadvantage for simply ‘acting their age’.

We want penalties for speeding in built-up areas – where kids are most likely to be out and about on foot and bicycles – to be appropriately severe. The Government is proposing the introduction of a sliding scale of fixed penalties for speeding offences. They propose that 2 points – rather than the current 3 – are imposed when a driver drives at up to 39mph in a 30mph zone44, meaning a driver would have to commit this offence six times before receiving a ban. We say this is unacceptable.

There is a high probability that a child pedestrian hit by a vehicle at 39mph will be killed, whereas hit at speeds below 30mph, the likelihood is that they will survive5.

We want high fines of no lower than £1,000 plus four penalty points for anyone caught driving above the speed limit. Such high fines are often imposed for offences that are not life-threatening, such as littering. The Government’s proposals would only vary this fixed penalty fine from £40 to £10044 – not much of a deterrent to anyone who can afford to run a vehicle.

Reducing penalties for speeding in a 30mph zone is a road danger measure that would impact on communities’ human right to safety. It has no place in any road safety policy.

ALL QUERIES, PLEASE CONTACT: Brake, the road safety charity PO Box 548, Huddersfield, HD1 2XZ Tel: 01484 559909 e-mail: [email protected] website: www.brake.org.uk

44 Graduated fixed penalties for speeding offences – discussion note (Department for Transport, 2004)