The Australian Automobile Association and the Australasian New Car Assessment Program have shown support for the report behind the National Road Safety Strategy inquiry.
The AAA says it supports the inquiry’s findings and is pressing both sides of the political spectrum to “respond to the report and prioritise road safety in government decision making and funding”.
The AAA believes improvements to the nation’s road safety performance have stalled.
“The AAA’s Benchmarking of the National Road Safety Strategy Report shows that 1225 people died on our roads in 2017,” says chief executive Michael Bradley.
“We urgently need to reverse this tragic trend.
The inquiry’s comprehensive report is a wake-up call to all politicians,” he explains.
“In 2013 and 2014, road deaths fell below 1200 a year for the first time.
But in 2015, the toll began rising again.
“Our current road safety strategies aren’t working.”
Bradley says Australia’s road safety efforts, “will not make progress..until our political leaders recognise this.”
The inquiry suggests creating a federal road safety body and a cabinet minister “with specific multi-agency responsibility to address the hidden epidemic of road trauma including its impact on the health system.”
The report advises a $3 billion annual road safety fund commitment, along with annually published performance indicators measuring and reporting how “harm can be eliminated in the system”.
The report also recommends road safety become “a genuine part of business as usual within Commonwealth, state, territory and local government”, and undertake another review in March 2019.
The inquiry reveals failure to improve today’s road deaths and trauma landscape will cost Australia $300 billion by 2030.
Crash-testing body ANCAP says the inquiry report indicates, in addition to the 1200-plus killed and 36,000 injured on Australia’s roads annually, that more needs to be done to save lives.
ANCAP chief executive James Goodwin says the 2011-2020 strategy includes recommendation number seven, to ‘implement rapid deployment and accelerated uptake of proven vehicle safety technologies and innovation’, which mirrors their efforts.
“Our mandate is to eliminate road trauma through the testing and promotion of safer vehicles,” Goodwin says.
“Objective performance testing of autonomous safety technologies is a key focus for ANCAP, and we will continue to raise the bar to ensure Australians are provided with the safest vehicles possible,” he adds.
ANCAP suggests a good place to start in reducing road trauma is to improve the age of the national fleet with newer, safer vehicles.
“An area which requires greater focus is the age of the Australian vehicle fleet and its direct correlation to road fatalities,” Goodwin explains.
“More than 2.7 million registered vehicles on our roads aged 15 years or older.are unlikely to be fitted with safety features that we now expect from new,” he continues.
“A key element to improving the safety of the fleet is improving vehicle affordability,” Goodwin advises Canberra.
“New technologies should also be affordable and accessible which will require leadership from not just governments but also industry,” he concludes.
Join the conversation