Transport committee demands more action to reduce deaths

Lower speed limits and tougher enforcement of drink-driving laws are needed to reduce road deaths, the Commons Transport Committee said last week.

The committee also queried whether road injury and death statistics were accurate, as police and hospital figures differ.

Chairman Louise Ellman said road deaths were ‘the major public health problem of our age’. The committee said that, although last year saw a 7% fall in deaths on the roads, overall progress since 2000 had been ‘disappointing’.

Responding to the Commons Transport Committee announcement, Alan Kennedy, LARSOA vice-chair, said that reducing the drink drive limit is crucial.

He said: “It is good news that there has been a slight fall in the number of deaths on the roads, but we need government to take action to bring this figure down even more, and reducing the drink drive limit to 50mg is the obvious course of action.”

Earlier this month LARSOA wrote to government minister Jim Fitzpatrick MP urging him to confirm that the government was not proposing to scrap the proposed reduction from 80mg to 50mg of alcohol per 100ml of blood.

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