NEWS Road safety
Road deaths and injuries rise after end of Covid lockdowns ● Provisional Government data reveals a seven per cent increase Chris Rosamond
Chris_Rosamond@autovia.co.uk
ACCIDENTS
Deaths and injuries on British roads have gone up following the relaxation of Covid lockdowns
Is police visibility an issue? OUR investigation into UK traffic policing (Issue EXCLUSIVE Our report revealed how police 1,712) revealed declining numbers of patrols and officers were concerned by the poor training. With increasing reliance on video reduction in traffic cop numbers evidence supplied by members of the public to prosecute offenders, officers believe a lack of visible policing means some drivers How dire is the state of UK roads policing? EXCLUSIVE: Police federatioonng ing will take more chances. slams ‘invisible’ traffic policin
MOTORSPORT specialist Prodrive has confirmed that it is working on a new restomod version of the Subaru Impreza to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the World Rally Car version of the famous model. The P25 will be more powerful and lighter than its inspiration, the Impreza 22B, which was a limited-edition model created by Subaru in 1998 to commemorate the company’s motorsport successes. Power will come from a 2.5-litre flat-four boxer engine that will produce more than
10 1 June 2022
400bhp. It will be paired with a six-speed semi-automatic gearbox. The firm plans to build 25 examples of the new creation at its Oxfordshire headquarters. The bodyshell, with extensive carbon fibre, has been styled by Peter Stevens, the man behind the look of the first Impreza WRC. The P25 is due to make its debut at the Goodwood Festival of Speed this month. It will cost over £500,000, but Prodrive said about half of the cars had been sold within 48 hours of the project’s announcement.
to review evidence uploaded
by drivers as traffic cop numbers
decrease
Tristan Shale-Hester
tristan_shale-hester@autovia.co.uk @tristan_shale
using dash-cam POLICE are increasingly motorists to footage posted online by as the number of pursue traffic offenders, declines. specialised traffic patrols to Auto Official police data supplied of traffic officers Express shows the number fallen by 16 per cent patrolling UK roads has longer-term trend. since 2015, following a 45 police forces Meanwhile, 38 of the UK’s Dash Cam Safety have adopted the National three years ago Portal, a website launched which allows by dash-cam maker Nextbase, of alleged traffic drivers to upload footage review. More than offences for the police to uploaded, and 50,000 clips have been resulted in police Nextbase says a third have to prosecutions. action, from warning letters Police road PC Lee Barton of West Mercia 98 per cent of policing division, said that with result in the uploads his force deals per cent are for police action, but only two dangerous driving. serious offences such as a reported traffic He added: “Dealing with of police work offence has gone from hours are now reporting down to minutes. People the road when things that happened on have bothered.” they previously wouldn’t a typical 10-hour According to Barton, on officers might pull shift in a patrol car, two among over an average of five vehicles officer can follow other duties, whereas one
● Standards and number of road police has declined ● Traffic officers increasingly forced to do non-traffic jobs
“More than 50,000 clips have been uploaded, and Nextbase says a third have result in police action, from warning letters to prosecutions”
UK roads policing After an Auto Express investigation reveals traffic cop speaks out is in disarray, the Police Federation’s top
of cases up a far greater number website. in the same time via the who Chief Inspector Rob Dickinson, roads and oversees Cheshire Police’s lets him crime unit, says virtual policing a range of deploy traffic officers across us to target duties. “This model enables current organised criminality using being tasked intelligence and officers with the through an operations room a truly hostile aim of making Cheshire he said. environment for criminals,” hasn’t been The changing emphasis camera can welcomed on all sides. “A stop them record incidents, but it can’t like to have from happening. We would in the extra seen some traffic officers last year by the 20,000 police announced said. government,” an AA spokesman group Silie Carlo, director of campaign “The ANPR Big Brother Watch, added: innocent drivers network already surveils photos a day. and captures 40 million encourage is The last thing we need to spying on each other.”
Motorists can upload footage to the National Dash Cam Safety Portal if they have captured potential traffic offences
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14 5 January 2022
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“PEOPLE using our roads every day have the right to feel secure and be kept safe. They deserve dedicated, professional, well trained police officers, being and it is frustrating to witness them become let down by roads policing that has virtually invisible,” says one of Britain’s most experienced traffic cops. Tim Rogers enrolled as a police officer as a in 1995, spending most of his career roadtraffic cop – including 10 years as a death investigator. He’s now the Police and Federation’s national driver training Auto pursuits lead, and he opened up to Express about the dire state of UK roads to policing following our exposé of cuts traffic officer numbers and the rise of policing by citizen-supplied dash-cam footage (Issue 1,710, top right). – “Back in 2009, West Midlands Police small which is my force – had 20 different out traffic divisions, and we’d be putting us. around 30 cars every day,” Rogers told “Then you think about what we’d have inside those cars in terms of the training, as skill and ability needed to be classed a traffic officer able to deal with myriad
road-traffic offences.” time These standards have slipped over which due to budget cuts, Rogers told us, areas. has led to a decline in expertise in all “Government is saying there’ll be 20,000 putting additional bobbies, but they’re just over back what they’ve taken from policing a number of years, and with insufficient also thought about the infrastructure that disappeared as part of those cutbacks, In three including the investment in training. will years’ time, 30 per cent of the workforce said. have less than five years’ service,” he to “To train people to an adequate level years, deal with the issues on the road takes it takes a lot of investment and we simply haven’t got that. So we’re going to be years.” 15 or 10 for playing catch-up “We police by the consent of the public. and A dash cam can identify an offence per a summons can be sent out, but 60 cent of people who commit a road-traffic offence are involved in other criminality. public We’re missing that, and it’s what the safe. wants us to deal with to keep them “The standard of driving is pretty appalling, but the people you’re going
was published, I think there have been some minor improvements in some areas, but the updates forces have given us have been a bit bland and I’m not completely convinced by their analytical capabilities. “The fundamental point,” Parr told us, “is traffic is not considered a priority in police forces.”
Main report findings:
tristan_shale-hester@autovia.co.uk @tristan_shale
“A drastic reduction in traffic levels saw road casualty rates fall enormously in 2020”
WE pulled these quotes from a damning HM Inspectorate of Constabulary report on roads policing published in May 2020 during the first lockdown. It paints a bleak picture of cuts, inadequate training and strategic failures. HM Inspector of Constabulary Matt Parr told us: “Since the report
MATT PARR HM Inspector of Constabulary
● “Roads policing in some forces is inadequate” meet demand” ● “Often capability and capacity don’t engagement with partners and the public” ● “Lack of co-ordination hinders effective
Tristan Shale-Hester
10 Special Issue
Prodrive P25 marks 25th birthday of Impreza WRC
OFFICIAL Police use portal
NEWS INVESTIGATION
Road-traffic policing
NEWS Policing using dash-cam footage
Dash-cam footage increasingly used to target traffic offenders
NEWSINVESTIGATION Road-traffic policing
Does the UK need a National Roads Police Force?
Cuts have led to a decline in all areas
of policing, Rogers says, not just in traffic
To train people to an adequate level to deal with the issues on the road takes years, it takes a lot of investment and we simply haven’t got that. So we’re going to be playing catch-up for 10 or 15 years TIM ROGERS Driver training lead, Police Federation
cops
those to moderate by sending out letters are who like me, who’ll take greater care. Is that we want to be targeting as a police service? highPotentially alienating them, while the idiots?” level criminals continue to drive like “That’s why we need that bobby interacting with drivers and getting hands on,” said Rogers. “But most feel undervalued, and their roles diluted. “Ask traffic officers nowadays what roads percentage of their time is spent on say policing,” he continued, “and they’ll very little, as they’re pushed from pillar to post and mismanaged with jobs that have nothing to do with road safety.”
We police by the consent of the public. A dash cam can identify an offence and a summons can be sent out, but 60 per cent of people who commit a road-traffic offence in other involved are criminality. We’re missing that, and it’s what the public wants us to deal with to keep them safe TIM ROGERS Driver training lead, Police Federation
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the ONE previously mooted solution to of a problems of roads policing is the creation following nationwide road-traffic police force, Police. a similar model to the British Transport May The idea was first raised when Theresa not was Home Secretary and although it’s at something that’s officially being actioned the the moment, Auto Express understands it on Department for Transport (DfT) is keeping Office, the table in discussions with the Home to in case funding for roads policing continues police decline. For now, it’s more likely that to and crime commissioners will be advised dedicate more funds to road policing. it believe force national a of Advocates of roads would address the common problem incidents. police being diverted to non-traffic is the Another issue that could be dealt with for lack of standardised training requirements which police officers to serve as traffic cops, described has resulted in a lack of expertise as report in the HM Inspectorate of Constabulary (right). Some funding could also be ringfenced body. for traffic policing under an independent well. But there’s resistance to the idea as supplies The Metropolitan Police, for example, City and hundreds of officers to police London them from Heathrow Airports, with funding for lead the airport operators. Such arrangements to hesitancy among forces for any shake-ups.
“The number of dedicated roads policing officers has declined, while their responsibilities for supporting general policing have increased. In some cases, resources have been reduced without any understanding of demand.” “Between 2013 and 2019, the expenditure for roads policing has reduced by about 34 per cent in real terms, which is approximately £120million.” “At the time of our inspection one force’s staffing was 20 per cent below the minimum required level. As a result, roads-policing patrols stopped at 2am.” “One supervisor told us officers in his roads-policing unit weren’t experienced or trained in all required skills.”
Report quotes “At times, one officer provided the total roads-policing response for an entire county.” “We found roads-policing officers whose training was so inadequate they couldn’t identify and prosecute offences relating to heavy-goods vehicles. A group of less experienced officers joked they ‘only stop vehicles we can see over’.” “In one force, a lack of support left the roads-policing team relying on social media and their personal mobile phones to share intelligence.” “Officers in some forces spent only 20 per cent of their time on roads-policing duties. We were
told that ‘no-one thanks you for being tied up with a drink-drive prisoner for two hours’.” “Forces were unable to demonstrate that enforcement activity was based of on a comprehensive understanding the causes of deaths and serious injury on the roads in their area.” “One partner agency told us that they regularly provide a force with road safety data, but they suspected that the force ‘did nothing with it’.” “There is no accredited national training programme for roads policing officers. As a result, there is inconsistency in how, when, and to what level officers are trained. The continued professional development of officers is inconsistent and insufficient.”
Fixed-penalty tickets issued for traffic offences THIS chart illustrates the decline in numbers of fixed-penalty tickets issued for certain road traffic offences in England and Wales. Fixed penalties for speeding, which have increased, are excluded from this graph because they are identified mainly by cameras.
2011 to 2018
Home Office
have been collecting data on the types of owner. Interestingly, Nottinghamshire Police recorded more private e-scooter injuries compared with those in rental schemes, which highlights the need to properly regulate e-scooter specifications before allowing them on our roads,” he added. RAC head of roads policy Nicholas Lyes said: “Our research suggests there is a huge level of concern among drivers about the standard of driving on our roads. “We urge the Government to consider re-introducing road safety targets,” he added. “They should also look at whether the long-term decline in full-time road traffic police officers has led to a worsening in driver behaviour and an increase in casualties as a result.”
Figures for England and Wales. Source:
THERE were 1,560 fatalities on Britain’s roads in 2021, according to provisional official Government statistics released last week, which is a seven per cent increase on the number recorded the previous year. A drastic reduction in traffic levels due to Covid lockdowns saw road casualty rates fall enormously in 2020, but as restrictions relaxed and traffic returned to the roads, figures show that death and injury rates also began to climb again. Jack Cousens, who leads on roads policy for the AA, says the organisation had been hoping that the reduction in road injuries could be sustained for longer. “Sadly that wasn’t the case,” he said. “The one glimmer of hope is that the total number of casualties last year remains lower than pre-pandemic levels, so we need that to be the turning point in order to make our roads as safe as possible.” A rise in the number of people cycling over the past two years was accompanied by a spike in fatalities amongst cyclists in 2020, yet that figure dropped by a fifth in 2021. But e-scooters continue to cause problems, and Cousens said there are still lessons to be learned about the incidents e-scooters are involved in, and the injuries they cause. “While the number of collisions increased significantly from 2020, initial reporting shows that riders are more likely to hurt themselves rather than others,” he said. While e-scooters are legal in only a few trial schemes, evidence suggests their users have fewer incidents than illegal riders. “Despite the fact e-scooters are only legal through rental schemes, some police forces
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