HC Deb 31 October 2001 vol 373 cc678-9W
Peter Bottomley

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, Local Government and the Regions (1) if he will publish the Transport Research Laboratory's estimate of the comparative effects of the full mandatory pedestrian protection standards for cars and the voluntary approach; [11138]

(2) which EC directorate proposed the voluntary proposals for pedestrian protection standards for vehicles; and if he will publish the scientific basis and assessment of the consequences of the differences from the mandatory Working Group 19 proposals. [11134]

Mr. Jamieson

[holding answer 30 October 2001]: The proposals originated from DG Enterprise, who have been engaged in discussions with the vehicle manufacturers' representatives on this issue over the past year.

The work by TRL assessing the benefits of the first phase of the negotiated agreement relative to the benefits of the full EEVC WG17 proposals (which would be delivered in the second phase) has been within a tight timescale, so any figures provided have been on an informal basis. Figures may evolve or be refined before they can be incorporated into an intermediate or final publishable report.

Benefits of the first phase of the negotiated agreement relative to EEVC WG17:

The initial work focused on a critique of the 80 per cent. relative benefit for killed and seriously injured pedestrians claimed by industry. Using what was believed to be similar assumptions, TRL arrived at relative benefits of 60 per cent. for fatals and 70 per cent. for seriously injured. We said, when we recently consulted on the Commission's proposal, that the benefits were being looked at afresh. This new approach uses databases from Europe, Japan and the USA and test and other data. This suggests that the relative benefit is around 25 per cent. for fatals and 60 per cent. for seriously injured.

Absolute benefits:

The benefit for the full EEVC proposals changes slightly to 10 per cent. fatals and 20 per cent. seriously injured compared with the values of 8 per cent. and 21 per cent. which we have traditionally used.

TRL's work on this will be available in an interim report in early 2002.