UK Vehicle Safety Falling Behind Global Best Practice
By David Ward
From 7th July the UK has fallen further behind global best practice in vehicle safety among the Group of 20 leading industrial countries. This is because the recently defeated Conservative Government has failed to apply life saving technologies now being mandated across the European Union (EU) which today is the world’s third largest vehicle market.
Grouped together in a package called the General Safety Regulation (GSR) the new EU standards feature the phased introduction of technologies including autonomous emergency braking (AEB), intelligent speed assistance (ISA), revised crash test standards to improve occupant safety for women, and better truck visibility to reduce blind spots. According to the UK’s Transport Research Laboratory the GSR has the potential to have a greater safety benefit than the introduction of seat belts. They estimate that in the UK over the next 15 years it could prevent 1,762 deaths and 15,000 injuries avoiding so much misery and pain, and deliver £7 billion in net economic benefits.
Originally adopted in 2019 with an initial introduction date for new models of 6th July 2022 and for all vehicles in production July this year, Conservative Ministers at the Department for Transport have blocked any decision on the GSR. Putting the search for opportunities for Brexit divergence ahead of the lives of UK road users, they dithered and delayed rather than include these technologies in the UK’s new - post Brexit - GB Type Approval system. Despite the clear evidence that the GSR package will improve vehicle safety last year they commissioned TRL to carry out yet another cost benefit study. This was submitted in March but remains unpublished. Almost certainly because it is likely to show that implementation of the full GSR package will make our roads and vehicles safer.
A major reason for opposition to the GSR by Conservative Ministers has been their reluctance to support intelligent speed assistance. ISA is a safety device that continuously detects the speed limit through a combination of digital maps and cameras. It prevents the driver from exceeding the limit but can be overridden if needed. It encourages a relaxed ‘can’t speed, won’t speed’ driving style and reduces anxiety about getting speeding tickets and saves fuel. Given that speed is the single most significant factor in fatal and serious road crashes, it is well evidenced that ISA would boost road safety in the UK.
Trying to make the best of a bad job the DfT tried to play down the impact of not applying the GSR. Journalists have been told that the independent consumer safety rating body, the European New Car Assessment Programme, already includes ISA and that the GSR legislation is somehow superfluous. It is true that Euro NCAP’s ‘5 star’ test requirements usually exceed regulatory requirements; but these only cover passenger cars and not all models are tested & rated. Furthermore, the GSR will introduce long overdue safety improvements for all categories of commercial vehicles. Euro NCAP has only recently begun testing vans. And these results have revealed a poor level of safety equipment in vehicles that are disproportionately involved in fatal crashes and are a fast growing segment in the UK fleet. It would clearly be beneficial for ISA and AEB to be mandatory for vans on UK roads. There is no avoiding the fact that by diverging from the GSR UK vehicle safety regulations will be weaker than those being applied in the EU.
Divergence from best practice in global automotive standards is not just bad for road safety but also damaging to industry and innovation. The failure to align with the GSR will undermine UK leadership in the future deployment of connected and autonomous vehicles (CAVs). Although in their infancy these will eventually transform mobility as advanced vehicle safety systems become increasingly automated. ISA equipped vehicles capable of reading the speed limit will be a ‘sine qua non’ for future CAV mobility. By not requiring the technology the UK risks falling behind. The failure to align our vehicle regulations with the EU is like a slow puncture that will gradually deflate our safety standards and competitiveness.
Unsurprisingly the automobile industry does not want this technical divergence. According to the Chief Executive of the UK’s SMMT, Mike Hawes “with the heavily integrated nature of the UK and European automotive sectors, regulatory divergence is not advantageous for either party.” And that’s because more than 60% of UK automobile production is sold in the EU. So most of the SMMT’s output - also including vehicles sold in Northern Ireland - will have to meet the new EU regulations anyway. So if you want to be sure that your next car is as safe as possible order it from a dealer in Belfast!
Support for the GSR has become almost universal among the UK vehicle safety community. Nearly 100 organisations have approved a 2024 Road Safety Manifesto prepared by the Parliamentary Advisory Council for Transport Safety which recommends adoption of the GSR. Two years ago PACTS coordinated a letter to the then Secretary of State for Transport Grant Schapps by a cross party group of former road safety ministers. They urged him to introduce the GSR package adding that it is “the single most important thing you can do now to reduce deaths and injuries on UK roads” . That is why the Towards Zero Foundation is pleased to support a new letter - coordinated by the road safety organization Brake and the insurer AXA - to Louise Haig, the Labour Government’s recently appointed Secretary of State for Transport, which calls for early action to implement the GSR.
The previous government’s failure to adopt the GSR marked a retreat from UK leadership in global vehicle safety. In the late 1990s a British-led initiative to improve EU vehicle crash test standards for front and side impact has more than halved occupant deaths in Europe. This was followed by the launch of Euro NCAP. Together these initiatives have been the largest single contributor to reducing EU road deaths (including in the UK) from over 45,000 people in the mid 1990’s to less than 20,000 today. The GSR offers the prospect of a further improvement in road injury prevention aimed specifically this time to benefit not just vehicle occupants but all vulnerable road users. Given that we suffer almost 30,000 deaths and serious injuries on our roads every year, it surely should be a priority now for the Department of Transport to restore its global leadership in vehicle safety and adopt the life saving technologies of the GSR in full.
