HC Deb 01 July 1964 vol 697 cc1337-9
7. Mr. Dudley Smith

asked the Minister of Transport if he will arrange for comprehensive data and expert assessments of every serious road accident to be collated and studied by a special branch of his Department, with a view to obtaining more accurate information as to the pattern and main and contributory causes of deaths and serious injuries on the roads.

Mr. Marples

Detailed reports of the circumstances of every accident causing death or serious injury are supplied by the police. Other inquiries into particular features of accidents are carried out by various agencies. All this information is already studied by those concerned with road safety both in my Department and the Road Research Laboratory; but my Department is undertaking a review of the present machinery to see how effort in this field can best be deployed.

Mr. Smith

I thank my right hon. Friend for that reply, but does not he agree that the more advances we make in pinpointing the exact causes of accidents the greater chance there is of reducing the high level of death and serious injury on the roads? Does not he get the impression that there is a great danger that unless there is evidence for a clear-cut prosecution, or an inquest is involved, in the end there tends to be a haphazard method of gathering evidence, and that this does not come through to his Department as it should?

Mr. Marples

That is why we set up the inquiry within my Department. This will involve a lot of complicated organisational and statistical problems, but I hope that we shall get somewhere with our review. Most accidents result from a number of causes acting simultaneously, and are rarely due to one cause, but if we examine a number of accidents it may be possible to establish some factor which is common to them all, and we can take remedial measures in respect of it.

Mr. Callaghan

Is the Minister aware that a young woman in my constituency recently lost her life because of an accident which involved a lorry which was overloaded, had inefficient brakes and was badly driven, and that as a result the driver was fined a derisory sum? Why should this lorry not have been examined during the previous 12 months by his examiner? On the basis of the statistics with which the Minister has been kind enough to furnish me, I understand that it would be eight years, on average, before the lorry would be examined. Why should lorries escape examination in this way when private cars, once they have reached five years of age, have to be examined every year? Is the Minister aware that this is a growing scandal, and that there is considerable anger about the way in which some of these heavy lorries are maintained on the roads? I ask the Minister to divert some of his enthusiasm and energy into building up a proper inspection staff.

Mr. Marples

That is exactly what we are doing with these heavy vehicles. We are stepping up this summer our on-the-spot road inspections in all my divisional road engineers' areas. In addition, we are discussing with the manufacturers all sorts of ideas, including the question of power-to-weight ratio, so that they will be able to build to a better specification in the future. I can assure the hon. Gentleman that we have taken quite a number of steps.

Mr. Wingfield Digby

What progress is being made in ensuring that the police always give full reports of serious accidents to the local road engineers who are responsible for the relevant stretch of road? In many cases in the past these engineers have not received proper reports.

Mr. Marples

Investigation into certain aspects of road accidents is carried out by a number of agencies. The Road Research Laboratory carries out some, and so do my own vehicle examiners, local authority highway engineers and my Ministry's road engineers. We have area road safety units in Hampshire and Warwickshire, and these units are experimenting with new methods of collecting accident statistics and studying the whole problem. If we require assistance from the police we find that they are always willing to give it.

Mrs. Braddock

Does the additional information in this survey include the requirement to supply to the courts the date upon which the person concerned obtained a driving licence, and for how long he has driven? Is the Minister aware that magistrates dealing with these cases—and I am one—are handicapped because they have no knowledge of the length of time a person has been driving, and that that can have a great effect on the cause of accidents?

Mr. Marples

We are reviewing this. It will be some time before it is finalised. We will certainly take the hon. Lady's point into account in our review.

Mr. Callaghan

Is the Minister setting himself a programme to ensure that these heavy lorries are examined at least on the same basis as private cars so that there will come a time—we hope in the near future—when we shall know that every lorry on the road has been examined within a reasonable period?

Mr. Marples

I did not say so. I said that at the present time we have checks which take place on the roadside for the testing of brakes and other things, and I am stepping these up. At the same time, we are looking after the new vehicles; and when it becomes necessary to have other tests, we shall look into that, too.