New road safety guide for Lancashire’s community beat managers

Community beat managers around Lancashire are to receive a new guide to help them teach youngsters about road safety.

The new brochure, ‘Road Safety Support for Education Services’, has been produced by Lancashire County Council's Road Safety Group to help Lancashire Constabulary officers play their part in reducing the number of youngsters killed or seriously injured on the roads.

In 2002, 424 primary age children were involved in road crashes in Lancashire with 63 killed or seriously injured. In the same year 1049 secondary age students were involved in road crashes with 153 killed or seriously injured.

The publication will be circulated to all community beat managers and will also enable head teachers, governors, teachers, classroom assistants and parents to access road safety services.

Chief superintendent, Mike Barton, explained: "Community beat managers play a critical role in tackling local road safety concerns. The brochure contains some very useful casualty data, teaching ideas, and information on training and resources for children - it will be a useful resource to use in schools."

Community beat manager PC Carl Ingram said: "I work closely with schools in my area and road safety is one issue that is particularly important to them. I'm interested in looking at how journeys are made to and from school. The brochure will be a starting point to increasing road safety awareness. Hopefully we can encourage more walking and cycling to school and reduce the number of car journeys."

For further information please contact: Martin Crabtree on 01772 533536, martin.crabtree@css.lancscc.gov.uk.