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Prevention is better than punishment
Page 28
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SAFETY MEANS different things to different people. as three separate articles in a recent issue show (CMS October).To a politician safety means legislation, usually legislation that attempts to mitigate the effects of crashes (or punish those believed responsible). Hence in recent decades we have seen the breathalyser, speed limits, the compulsory wearing of seat belts and helmets, the use of hand-held mobile phones being banned. and laws concerning causing death by dangerous driving and now corporate manslaughter.
All relate to post-crash action. none to the more important role of prevention through education. Official statistics concern only those killed or seriously injured. with damage-only collisions not even recorded.
A driver died in a simple lowspeed car park collision: another survived a 300mph dragster crash. Extreme examples. perhaps. but virtually every road crash has an element of luck often just a few millimetres or milliseconds can make a major difference to the outcome. Serious safety lapses that do not result in a fatality tend lobe treated less seriously than those which do. Even worse, errors of omission tend to be ignored. whether or not a crash results, more than errors of commission.
Studying road crash reports and later relating them to any subsequent inquest report or prosecution can he enlighteninghut is all too often a source of despair at the sheer injustice of the process.
Anthony G Phillips Salisbury, Wilts