9 November 2006

LARSOA welcomes new Road Safety Act

LARSOA, the Local Authority Road Safety Officers' Association, has welcomed the government's new Road Safety Act but says it could have gained further mileage in the drive to make the UK's roads safer.

The Association particularly welcomes the introduction new offences of causing death by careless driving and causing death by driving while unlicensed, disqualified or uninsured.   It also welcomes the increase in penalties for using a hand-held mobile phone while driving.

Causing death by careless or inconsiderate driving will carry a custodial sentence of up to five years and causing death by driving while unlicensed, disqualified or uninsured, up to two years. Both are likely to come into law next year. The Act will also increase the penalty fines for careless and inconsiderate driving from £2,500 to £5,000.

The fixed-penalty fine for using a hand-held mobile phone while driving and for failing to exercise proper control of a vehicle will rise from £30 to £60 and drivers will also now receive three penalty points.

Simon Ettinghausen, Chair of LARSOA, says: "This highlights the seriousness of not paying attention when driving. Such actions can cause unnecessary collisions and the consequences for people who lose a loved one in such crashes are horrific.

"It also drives home the message of how dangerous it is to use a hand-held mobile phone when driving. Too many drivers still flout the law on this issue. We hope the increased fine and now gaining penalty points on their licence will deter more drivers from arranging their business or social lives when they should be paying attention to the road."

LARSOA also welcomes:

•  Broadening the government's powers to enable it to give grants to local authorities for road safety work.

•  New arrangements for driving instructors which will help improve the tuition given to young drivers who are a high-risk road user group.

•  Courses for drivers who might otherwise lose their licence - magistrates will have the option of offering remedial training as an alternative.

There will also be an extended range of penalty points for those caught speeding and drivers can be offered retraining. Says Mr Ettinghausen: "This will allow tougher punishment for those who commit the most serious speeding offences as well as helping them to change their behaviour. LARSOA looks forward to helping develop such courses which will add to the existing drink-drive, speeding and driver improvement courses which many of our members deliver."

However, LARSOA is disappointed the Act does not include other simple safety measures which would also have contributed to improving the UK's road safety record even more. These include:

•  Reducing the blood alcohol limit which would have highlighted the seriousness of the offence

•  Introducing graduated driver licensing for new drivers

•  Increasing the penalties for seat belt offences, in particular for drivers allowing children to travel without being correctly restrained

•  Introducing single/double summer time

Mr Ettinghausen concludes: "We have an excellent record of road safety in the UK but still too many people are killed or seriously injured in collisions and we must go that extra mile to cut the carnage caused by reckless and irresponsible drivers."

Ends.

For media enquiries please call Alison Ferst on 01287 610404 or 07779 435794.

ABOUT LARSOA

• LARSOA is a national road safety organisation representing road safety officers (RSOs) employed in local government across the UK.

• LARSOA represents 185 of the 200 eligible local authorities across the UK, assisting RSOs to fulfil their statutory role to reduce the number and severity of road casualties through education, training and publicity programmes.

• LARSOA publishes an up-to-date round-up of road safety news from across the UK on its website www.larsoa.org.uk .

• LARSOA also aims to influence national debate - government policy and action together with public opinion. The association works to achieve national recognition for road safety issues, commissions research into behaviour which contributes to road collisions and develops national road safety campaigns.

• The association assists in identifying achievable national targets to reduce the number of collisions on the country's roads.