§ Mr. TyrieTo ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions what research he has carried out in the last five years regarding the effects of airbags in reducing casualties and fatalities in car accidents; and if he will make a statement. [96933]
§ Mr. HillBetween 1993 and 1996, the Transport Research Laboratory (TRL) investigated airbag effectiveness at the Department's request. This included a review of published research on airbag testing and performance in the field. By necessity, this was based mainly on the experience in the US, where airbags have been in use for a number of years. TRL also looked at a sample of accidents in the UK, but the number available for examination was small and there was insufficient evidence to reach a conclusion on the efficacy of airbags in cars in the UK.
The Department, in collaboration with the motor industry, is actively involved in the Co-operative Crash Injury Study (CCIS), which collects detailed information on many aspects of crash protection from a sample of UK road accidents. CCIS is an ongoing study managed by the TRL and involving teams from Birmingham University, Loughborough University and the Vehicle Inspectorate. A study of available CCIS data by Loughborough University published in 1998 concluded that, of all the injured drivers they looked at, those in airbag equipped vehicles had less head injuries, but more arm injuries, than those in vehicles without airbags.
The relatively low number of cases involving airbag deployment is still a constraint in assessing the effectiveness of airbags. However, we anticipate that a clearer picture will begin to emerge as the number of CCIS investigations involving airbag equipped vehicles increases.