To understand speed is the key to genuine road safety policy on speed.
There are only three legal states of speed on the road
The three states are:Speeding, Dangerous & Careless
The aim of this report is to simplify the issue of how speed is a factor in road accidents.
This is extremely crucial because unnecessary and misleading complexities will lead to more death on the roads because of lost focus on true accident causes, unnecessary prosecution of perfectly safe drivers, the over-slowing of transport at £3,000,000,000 per year per 1MPH; with the attendant death from taking that kind of money from the Economy.
How the figures are based:
The above image is a section of the Stats 19/20 form on which most accident analysis is based. It is completed by non specialist reporting officers after every road accident. In practice this is the very last item that the officer will complete when he is now concerned with either booking off duty or dealing with other pressing matters. The form is not for his local force. It will then be given a cursory glance by a supervisor, another non-specialist, accepted and then passed on to the DfT.
From there all sorts of analysis will be conducted and conclusions drawn about accidents from this one complex form; normally completed by non-specialists in road safety or driving, and then in rather a dismissive or non-priority basis.
The form includes, as accident factors: items that are not factors at all yet excludes undoubted accident contributors too.
Quite simply......the form is wrong. The only thing that can be drawn from this exercise is that X% of unqualified officers ticked a box; in some cases a box that should not be there or worse they were unable to tick a box that should have been there. See more on this
Speed is the most misunderstood factor so far as the part it plays in road accidents and yet is the foundation of most road safety policy. So let us just focus on that for now.
There is a difference between speed & 'speeding'.
Speed: applies to everything- including our heartbeats- and because of that, is a factor in anything and everything. It is thus foolish, dishonest and pointless to make it an issue then as if only a factor in road accidents; it applies to everything.
So the legal states of speed on the roads break down to three simple offences then:
'Speeding' or Exceeding a speed limit: contrary to Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984 or The Motorways Traffic (Speed Limit) Regulations 1974. And solely applies to motor vehicles.
Driving without due care or consideration: contrary to Sec3 Road Traffic Act 1991
Dangerous Driving: contrary to Sec 2 of the RTA 1991
So, quite simply, the only legal states where speed is an issue is one of those three.
There is no such thing in law of 'driving too fast','excessive speed', 'in a hurry', and so on. Whilst these terms may well be useful for creating a picture of individual accidents, they allow much confusion and false statements to be made about speed and where it fits in the scheme of things.
So for example: the term 'excessive speed' is used by official bodies to replace 'speeding' whilst others assume it means 'too fast'. But why use a four syllable term (ex-cess-ive-speed) when there are the two syllable (spee-ding) or (too-fast), depending on what meaning is being applied, instead; unless there is a deliberate intent to dangerously mingle 'speeding' with 'too fast'?
'Speeding': Is merely the offence of going above an arbitrary and unscientific number on a pole.
There cannot be anything academic about the exact numbers 20,30,40,50,60, & 70 can there? The mathematical odds of those exact numbers being scientifically based on variable roads is about, 1000,000/1.
Arbitrary they certainly are since they are not set by any formula or by people who are driving experts either. Neither can, by simply going above one of these numbers, an accident be caused- any more than to stay below them will guarantee that no accident will be caused. In fact most accidents are below these limits anyway. So 'speeding', even if present, will never be the cause or 'factor' of an accident but would only be purely coincidental to an accident if present.
Dangerous driving: Causes accidents and it is under this heading, comes the element of 'driving too fast'. It is an element of dangerous driving and because driving too fast happens at all speeds, above and below the limits, 'driving too fast' cannot be an element of 'speeding' at all then. If a driver is driving too fast then he is driving dangerously: not merely 'speeding'. [Journalists please note that distinction].
Dangerous driving, often occurs below any speed limit. One can be dangerous without speeding at all.
Driving without due care: also causes many accidents and 'in a hurry' or 'not looking properly' would be background elements of driving without due care.
Do all three states cause accidents?
Exceeding the speed limit. 'Speeding': To go above an arbitrary number on a pole and cannot cause an accident. Hence there is no such offence as causing death by speeding is there?
Dangerous: Which can be at any speed, above or below the speed limit and does cause accidents. Often, driving at the speed limit will still be dangerous.
Careless: Which can be at any speed and does cause accidents. And again, above or below the limit at any speed.
'Speeding' if present, forms no part of the other two.Especially when the limit itself is probably set too low.
No worthwhile road safety report will include such fundamental errors as contained in Stats 19 or treat them as factual or without clarification on the issue of speed as a factor in accidents.
The D.P.U. Is able to look beyond Stats19 because its founder has had hands on experience in dealing with accidents and their subsequent prosecution (Including the submission of Stats 19).
Even SkyNews reports it badly
