The release of the National Road Safety Action Plan (2023-25) has garnered divided opinions from ANCAP Safety and the Australian Automobile Association (AAA).
ANCAP has welcomed the plan which it says will help focus government, industry and community efforts to improve road safety and reduce road trauma over the next three years.
But the AAA says the plan repeats mistakes of the past and risks having little impact on improving road safety outcomes.
ANCAP says it supports the prioritisation and proliferation of technology-based vehicle safety features, and encouraging consumer and fleet uptake of newer and inherently safer vehicles, which are clear action areas identified in the NRSS and Action Plan.
It says the action plan will also pursue targets for five star ANCAP rated vehicles with a date stamp of no more than six years, to encourage ongoing improvement in vehicle design and market supply of current five star vehicles.
“There’s no doubt that safety enhancements in light vehicles over the past decade have demonstrably improved road safety, with the average risk of death or serious injury in a crash to the driver of a vehicle manufactured in 2019 being 25% less than that of a driver in a vehicle manufactured in 2010. The road fatality rate has also dropped from 6.1 to 4.6 per 100,000 population,” ANCAP chief executive Carla Hoorweg says.
Currently 92% of all passenger vehicles, SUVs and light commercial vehicles sold are covered by an ANCAP rating, with 87% reaching the five star standard.
“Over the coming years, we will no doubt see further significant change in the vehicle safety landscape and ANCAP will continue to evolve and grow to ensure the broader vehicle fleet is equipped with the latest safety technologies. The objectives outlined in the Strategy and Action Plan should see a positive change in the number of lives lost and serious injuries sustained,” Hoorweg says.
AAA: Save lives, not seats
The Australian Automobile Association (AAA) says the action plan fails to deliver transparency reforms previously and repeatedly recommended by independent inquiries, government reviews, and expert advice.
“We have no information about rates of serious injury, the exact location of our most-dangerous black spots or the safety rating of the road. States and territories have this information, but it is not made public,” AAA managing director Michael Bradley says.
It says that one of the greatest roadblocks to improving road safety in this country is the non-publication of critical road safety data that could allow Australians to judge whether state and federal governments are investing in the right projects to improve road safety.
“Motorists and taxpayers have a right to full transparency of road safety data so they can be assured that governments are investing scarce public money where it is most needed to deliver safety outcomes. Public investment in roads must be about saving lives, not seats,” Bradley says.
“The new Federal Government has a golden opportunity to reset the dial on road safety by making its road funding grants to states contingent on transparency of road safety data. But this report is silent on the issue of evidence-based road funding. The Government must address this issue in May’s Budget,” he says.
The AAA welcomes the Action Plan’s acknowledgment that: ‘There is a critical need to improve national road safety data, and strengthen the evidence base for decisions on the most efficient and effective ways to deliver better road safety outcomes’’.
The AAA also welcomes the review of road safety research being undertaken by the Australian Government and all state and territory governments. Since 2019, the AAA has invested $3.4 million in its Road Safety Research Program.
But given the 5% increase in road deaths in 2022 in spite of government commitments to halve road deaths through the decade to 2030, a concrete data-driven response is needed to arrest this current trajectory says the AAA.
“It is unacceptable that Australian governments continue to commit to road safety reduction metrics that are unreported, unmeasured, or undefined,” it says.
The Action Plan states that the National Road Safety Data Collection and Reporting Framework, and National Road Safety Minimum Dataset won’t be delivered until late 2024.
This should be done sooner given the data will inform policy and the ambitious targets agreed in the Strategy which cannot be measured without the data says the AAA.
“This date will also be too late to leverage the new National Partnership Agreement on Land Transport Infrastructure Projects to require jurisdictions to provide road safety data to be eligible for road funding,” the AAA says.
The AAA says it looks forward to working with the proposed Road Safety Data Working Group, which will focus on making data available for measuring progress towards the National Road Safety Strategy (2021-30).
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