The killer cars

One of the many unfulfilled promises of the Labour government has been its commitment to a road safety strategy.

One of the many unfulfilled promises of the Labour government has been its commitment to a road safety strategy. Road safety was said to be a priority in 2024 but nothing has emerged despite Lilian Greenwood, the minister responsible promising the strategy would be published in 2025.

There is a desperate need for one. Road casualty deaths in the UK have remained annually around 1600-1700 but the number of pedestrian fatalities increased from 385 to 409 between 2022 and 2024. This rise is part of a wider phenomenon in many countries and the cause reason for it is all too obvious. A recent report in The Age newspaper about road deaths in the state of Victoria in Australia is unequivocal about the cause, the rise of the SUV. Pedestrian deaths in the state are at a 17 year high having increase by more than a quarter since 2015 with, the article says, ‘concerns the growing dominance of large SUVs and utes [utility vehicles] is reversing years of road safety gains’.

The Age cites Milad Haghani, a transport safety researcher at Melbourne University who said ‘there was a growing body of evidence to suggest that vehicle size was causing a nationwide increase in pedestrian deaths’, Indeed, he pointed out that Australia was in danger of following the same path as the US where pedestrian deaths hit an all time low in 2009 but then grew 77 per cent to hit a 40 year high in 2022 – a period in which there had been a massive increase in the adoption of SUVs. It is children that are the most at risk due to height of these cars’ bonnets. While SUVs are 44 per cent more likely to kill an adult pedestrian or cyclist in a crash compared with an ordinary ‘sedan’, for children the figure is a shocking 82 per cent. This is the story of bull bars (which I have cited in a previous substack, here) being repeated, but this time no one is, so far, making a fuss about it. A quote from a local police officer sums up the extra danger: ‘They are large vehicles, designed for a certain specific task that are being used on roads that perhaps aren’t fit for that task’. In London, they are dismissively called Chelsea tractors and they serve no rational purpose in an urban environment.

The evidence over the extra danger posed by these vehicles is mounting which hopefully will put pressure on governments to act. According to a recent study by the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, children under the age of 10 are three times more likely to be killed if struck by an SUV rather than a standard sized cars. Yet, the British government wants to see more children walking and cycling to school. These two policies – allowing the spread of SUVs and seeking to make the road environment safer for vulnerable groups – are quite simply incompatible. Ms Greenwood’s road safety strategy, when it finally emerges, must address this issue.

In many respects governments across the world legislate to improve the safety of its citizens. In many fields, ranging from vaccine campaigns and smoking to the installation of sewers and the banning of coal burning in cities, governments have acted to improve safety in the face of public pressure and compelling evidence. Other transport modes such as aviation and railways have become almost accident free as a result of improved safety measures and better technology. Yet, motor vehicles have moved in the opposite direction. The long term improvement in casualty figures as a result of, for example, seat belt legislation and reduction in drunk driving has stalled because cars are becoming more dangerous – not for their occupants but for those outside them. Yet, somehow politicians sit on their hands, unable or, rather, unwilling to confront this deadly phenomenon.

Indeed, I suspect the delay over the road strategy is the result of ministers’ concerns that the motoring industry is not going to like what it might recommend. The growth in sales of SUV has boosted the profits of the car manufacturers as these bigger vehicles are more expensive and, indeed, massively overpriced, and trying to rein back on their sales will not go down in an industry that Labour sees as crucial for its growth agenda.

Just to end on a lighter note, there is a substantial evidence from the more remote parts of the US that the reintroduction of wolves reduces the number of road accidents. How? According to a study supported by the Pulitzer Centre, wolves tend to use well established trails, such as roads, to move around. Consequently deer tend to stay away from the roads and this reduces the likelihood of cars colliding with them. The report actually found statistically-based evidence to back up this argument. Shame we can’t set the wolves on to SUVs.

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