hutton_d

From Welcome to Safe Speed the first letter is copied below - should arm you with a few questions ... but one from me. Give him/her a Scamera (and always refer to them as Scameras ...) site and ask for the accident statistics for that site for 5 years up to it's installation and every year since. For each accident ask for the *primary* cause and the speed of the vehicles involved .....


But from Safespeed:

14th March 2007


Dear Road User,

It's time to get angry. Department for Transport (DfT) is following a road safety policy that they no longer believe in because they would rather save face than save lives.

I'm quite sure that they used to believe that 'speed cameras saved lives', but in the last few years that's changed.

In May 2005 they decided that speed camera side effects needed to be researched.

In December 2005 they discovered that neglect of a statistical bias had exaggerated the main benefit of speed cameras by 400%. The claimed '100 lives per year saved at speed camera sites' is downgraded to 25 lives saved.

In June 2006 they discovered that the ongoing beneficial trend in road crash serious injuries was just a feature of the way these crashes are reported. Hospitalisation statistics don't show the same trend. Road deaths don't show the same trend.

In September 2006 they discovered that the proportion of injury crashes involving any speeding vehicle nationally was only 5% - not the 'one third' that they had previously claimed.

In 2007 it gets nasty.

In January the new funding for speed cameras was announced as grants given to local authorities. They quite deliberately chose not to ring fence the funding in the full knowledge that this will lead to a budgetary squeeze that will help speed cameras to fade away. There's also a transfer of responsibility for cameras away from DfT and towards local authorities - that's because DfT don't want the flak.

In March we learned via Freedom of Information request that the speed camera side effects research (announced in May 2005) had been axed. It is inconceivable that the side effects DON'T cost more than 25 lives per year, meaning that speed cameras are making road safety worse. But DfT doesn't want to hear this, which is the only possible reason for axing the most important research.

So here's the truth. Speed camera policy has failed catastrophically. Department for Transport KNOWS that it has failed but won't admit their deadly mistake and pull the plug. They seem to be hoping that speed cameras will fade away over the next five years, yet they know that the policy isn't working and is costing lives. If that's not a reason for road users to get angry, I don't know what is.

What can you do?

- You can help us by joining the campaign or by donating. I can't stress enough how important this is. We're on a shoe string budget and desperately need better funding, but we're right at the forefront of putting this mess right. We're fighting against massive resources and need all the help we can possibly get.

- You can sign our 10 Downing street petition to 'scrap speed cameras'. At the very least this will help us to highlight the need for far better information, and ultimately for road safety policies that work.

- You can write letters to newspapers or to your MP.

- You can find out more by exploring this website or by joining the forums.

Whatever you do, don't do nothing, don't leave it to someone else and don't put up with it. It's time to get angry.

Yours faithfully




Paul Smith
Safe Speed campaign founder