RAC and IAM condemn cuts to road safety TV advertising
The RAC and the Institute of Advanced Motorists (IAM) have condemned the axing of children’s road safety TV advertising by the Department of Transport.
Figures unveiled last week following a Freedom of Information request from IAM showed that spending on road safety campaigning had been cut by around 80% in the last four years, from £19 million in 2008-09 to just £3.57 million in 2012-13*. This was then followed by confirmation that road safety TV adverts will no longer be shown in England due to budgets being re-prioritised.
According to Department for Transport statistics, in the mid-1990s an average of 130 children were killed as pedestrians on Britain’s roads every year, but by 2011 – the most recent year for which figures are available – the number had fallen to 33, a slight rise from 2010 when numbers went as low as 26.
RAC technical director David Bizley said: "Since the 1960s, public awareness programmes have made an important contribution to drastically reducing the number of pedestrians killed on Britain’s roads. We know that these campaigns work, which makes it all the more inexplicable that funding for them is being slashed and that TV advertising is being ended altogether. Worryingly, the number of children killed on Britain’s roads rose last year, which shows the need to continue educating both drivers and pedestrians on how to use the road network safely and effectively. The cost of an advertising campaign seems a small price to pay to save a child’s life, particularly when it represents such a tiny proportion of the overall DfT budget.”
IAM chief executive Simon Best said: “The human and social costs of road accidents are immeasurable, but with the cost of each fatal casualty on the road estimated to be £1.7 million, it makes no financial sense to cut campaigns. The returns on investment in road safety are huge. We all remember television road safety campaigns from our childhoods, so we know they have an impact. ”
