The Speed Kills Myth

The speed kills myth – the grab begins!

AS the sixties drew to a close it became apparent that a subtle change was coming over the authorities.

The interest in saving lives seemed to be waning and being replaced with an interest in persecuting the motorist.

In 1969 the seminal work on road safety, 'Road Accidents – Prevent or Punish' was published. (originally printed by Cassell and Company it was reprinted in 2007 by the Quinta Press. ISBN 978-1-897856-29-1.)

It was written by J J Leeming B.Sc (Oxon), ACGI, FICE, MI Struct.E, MI Mun.E, Finst.HE, a very experienced engineer who had been involved in road engineering for both Oxford and Dorset counties for over 40 years.

The thrust of his work was a warning against blaming the motorist for every accident and instead called for the correct analysis of why accidents happen before apportioning blame. The foreword to his book makes interesting reading:

"This book is dedicated to the countless thousands who have died on the roads of the world as a result of the prejudices of a minority, as some reparation and the faint hope that it may induce some government somewhere, to begin trying to stop accidents."

His ideas were revolutionary in that he didn't believe that slowing down traffic would automatically cause a drop in accidents. In fact he states in the introduction:

"I have spent forty years of my life increasing the speed of traffic to reduce accidents, with some success."

This attitude, based on real experience, didn't endear him to the so-called 'road safety experts' who just relied on prejudice against the car to form their policies.

Leeming tells of one particular incident where a certain stretch of road was apparently having more than it's fair share of accidents.

A survey discovered the reason and Leeming suggested building a lay-by.

However, the parish council, wanting to flex its muscles, demanded that a 30mph speed limit be enforced against the advice of both Leeming and the police.

When the council turned this down, they circumvented the process by installing streetlights that automatically brought in a 30mph limit.

The accident rate increased. When Leeming reported this, the Parish Council representative said: "My Council doesn't mind if accidents have increased. We have got our speed limit!"

Astonishingly the 'Road Safety Committee' supported him!

This appalling attitude was to become more noticeable as time progressed.

With the decision apparently being taken to wage war on the motorist the propaganda machine creaked into life.

When attacking an enemy certain steps must be taken, it is a formula that must be followed for eventual success.

First the enemy must be readily identifiable, it is no good for instance waging war against all those 5ft 7ins tall - how would you instantly pick them out?

The motorist is an ideal target as he is in effect the only person in Britain who is required to carry an ID card. It is called a vehicle registration plate and it enables full details of the driver to be accessed on demand. The Nazis made sure the Jews were identifiable by forcing them to wear Stars of David on their clothing.

Secondly, the enemy must be accused of atrocities, and proof provided. The Jews were accused of everything from the murder of German babies to taking control of the finances of the country.

Thirdly, the solution must be offered, and the solution usually involves rigid obedience to the authorities.

The solution to the Jews and the Communists was the Nazi Party.

Of course, the whole campaign relies on the truth being stifled and lies offered as truth. It is ironic that Hitler used as the basis for his campaign the successful propaganda war waged by the British in World War I.

It goes without saying that anyone daring to challenge the lies must be crushed and neutralised, usually by accusing them of being the same sort of criminal the Government were waging war against.

In the war against the motorist the hatred, spite and vitriol aimed at those who did not follow the 'Accepted Truth' was all too common.

The left wing reporter George Monbiot referred to people who did not accept the anti-car propaganda as: "The Anti-Social B******s in Our Midst. Posted December 20, 2005

The car is turning us into a nation of libertarians

By George Monbiot. Published in the Guardian 20th December 2005

The road rage lobby couldn't have been more wrong. Organisations like the Association of British Drivers and "Safe Speed" - the boy racers' club masquerading as a road safety campaign"

The use of offensive language and the derogatory terms used to describe those organisations that didn't accept the perceived wisdom should be noted.

Having identified the targets of the campaign to the world, the next thing was to dream up some atrocities that they could be blamed for.

The atrocities were of course the people killed and injured on the roads for which the motorist must accept sole blame.

The previous road safety campaigns were quietly dropped; because they espoused the sensible message that road safety was the responsibility of all road users.

The Green Cross Code man faded from our screens in 1990, together with all the other televised adverts for road safety. Since the message of these was to exhort pedestrians to cross the road safely one must ask - why they were taken off?

The message is timeless, unless of course you are trying to convince the population that every accident is the fault of the motorist.

Since then there have been hundreds of adverts blaming the motorist for all accidents, and only one suggesting that it might not be a good idea to run into the road without looking.

On several occasions the authorities shot themselves in their collective feet. One series of adverts showing a driver late for work mowing down a poor defenceless pedestrian late for work was quietly dropped when it was pointed out the pedestrian had dashed into the road a matter of yards from a pelican crossing.

Likewise, another series showing a boy being run over by a car doing 40mph was also dropped when it was pointed out that if the child had not run blindly into the road the speed of the car would have been immaterial as the accident wouldn't have happened.

Another series showing an apparently dead child saying 'If I had been hit at 30mph I might have survived' is also under attack.

It has been pointed out that all these anti-car adverts can be run with a different commentary and give the message that the fault is that of the careless pedestrian.

The slogan to the dead child advert would only have to be replaced with 'If only mummy had shown me how to cross the road properly I might have survived'.

Now for the atrocity message to work of course it must be continually emphasised that the accident rate on British roads is excessive. This is where Goebbels's message plays its part.

"If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it."

There must be no dissension in the message, Britain's roads are a slaughterhouse and the fault is solely the motorist. But what is the truth? In comparison with 36 other developed countries Britain narrowly comes 5th in fatalities per 100,000 inhabitants.

In comparison with 14 other countries fatalities per one Billion vehicle kilometres travelled in 2003, Britain with two fatalities came second behind Finland with 1.4. Far from Britain's' roads being awash with blood, our casualty rate had enjoyed a long, sustained fall. This was shortly to change.

The truth was that the numbers of Killed and Seriously Injured (KSI) on Britain's' roads were extremely small, around the 3,800 per annum.

Of course when this was pointed out the propaganda machine countered with the claim that 'One death was too much'.

This might bear some weight until a quick look at the figures shows that some 40,000 people die in Britain through hypothermia, 80,000 die whilst in hospital due to infections caught whilst in hospital and some 5,000 drown in the bath.

Leeming in his book has a chapter about propaganda and covers this very point.

If you welcome to your home your grandmother and she falls down the stairs and kills herself, her death passes unnoticed.

If you take her for a drive and she dies in a car accident the incident now makes the front page.

Having successfully launched parts one and two, the public were now ready for part three – the solution.

Here the propaganda machine defined its target. The problem they said was not the ordinary motorist, but the speeding motorist. If only we could find some method of detecting the speeding motorist, the problem would be solved.

But wait, we have the answer 'The Gatso Camera'. Here is a machine that will record the details of every speeding motorist; this is the way to save lives.

Of course, the first thing they had to do was to define what they meant by a 'speeding motorist'. The answer was simple; anyone breaking an arbitrarily set speed limit would be guilty.

In an attempt to show they were really doing this for safety reasons and not simply to raise money, cameras would only be sited where there had been several speed-related deaths in the previous five years.

These speed cameras would only be placed at accident black spots. Who could possibly argue with that? Well, quite a few people actually.

The original cameras were all painted grey, one of the primary camouflage colours. If the purpose of them was to warn people of black spots why hide them?

This argument also held sway over the positioning of cameras behind trees and traffic signs. This argument finally won through and the cameras were ordered to be painted yellow and sited in plain view.

Signs announcing the presence of these speed cameras were also ordered to be erected, and soon they sprouted up all over the country.

In Part four we will see how the government actually treats motorists worse than murderers.