The Federal Opposition’s commitment to establishing a National Office of Road Safety – announced today at the Labor Party’s National Conference in Adelaide – is a crucial first step to getting the failing National Road Safety Strategy back on track.

Australian Automobile Association Chief Executive Michael Bradley welcomed Labor’s pledge to set up a federal road safety body.

“For more than a year, the AAA has been calling for all parties to support this policy,” Mr Bradley said.  “We are pleased that the recently completed Inquiry into the National Road Safety Strategy and the Labor Party have endorsed this stance.”

The National Office of Road Safety will enhance data collection, promote best-practice research and lead the development of the next 10-year National Road Safety Strategy, which will start in 2021 and will draw upon the findings of the Inquiry into the National Road Safety Strategy 2011-20.

“AAA congratulates Labor for showing federal leadership in road safety,” Mr Bradley said.

“We will also continue to lobby the federal Coalition to support the establishment of a national road safety body.

“This is the serious response we need for a crisis that kills more than 100 Australians every month and costs the economy $30 billion every year.

“The National Road Safety Strategy is failing to meet crucial targets, and a National Office of Road Safety is essential to rectifying this.

“All states signed up to strategy in 2011, but none of them are on track to meet their targets by 2020.”

The National Road Safety Strategy is failing to:

• reduce road fatalities by 30 per centfrom 2008-2010 totals – deaths have fallen by less than 15 per cent, and progress in further reducing fatalities has stalled
• reduce serious injuries by 30 per cent– this target cannot be evaluated as Australia still lacks a national measurement of serious injuries from road crashes.

“The latest data – and a string of horrific accidents in the first half of December – confirms the recently released findings of the Inquiry into the National Road Safety Strategy,” Mr Bradley said.

The Inquiry’s final report noted the strategy’s “implementation failure”; the failure of government to monitor or report on agreed Key Performance Indicators; and the lack of quality data – described as “an embarrassment for the nation”. It also said the scale of the current response was “inadequate against the size of the problem”.

The Inquiry called for more federal government oversight of the National Road Safety Strategy – including establishing a federal body to oversee the Strategy and its roll out, to ensure its systems and programs are implemented and that KPIs are measured and reported.

The federal government has yet to fully respond to the Inquiry’s report.  The AAA hopes to soon discuss all of the Inquiry’s recommendations in detail with the Deputy Prime Minister, who has carriage of road safety issues.