Road Toll Statistics - Australia Getting Worse
24 May, 2007
9 Comments 
Thanks to Gary Hughes from The Australian we came across some vital statistics. Australia’s road toll figures show Australia falling behind the rest of the developed nations.
In 2005, Australia Ranked 7th best out of 15 nations (OECD nations) for road deaths per 100 million vehicle kilometres travelled (0.8 deaths). That might sound good, but in 2004 Australia ranked 4th and in 2003 it was 3rd.
What has happened in those few years that have caused this trend? The government has little to hide behind and its obvious that the new state (and federal) government’s road safety agenda is failing - badly.
If we compare Australia to a greater pool of nations, we are ranked 11th. Nations performing better than Australia (8 road deaths per 100,000 population in 2005) were:
- Netherlands (4.6),
- Norway (4.9),
- Sweden (4.9),
- Great Britain (5.5),
- Switzerland (5.5)
- Denmark (6.1),
- Japan (6.2),
- Iceland (6.3),
- Germany (6.5)
- Finland (7.2).
Full table :
Between 2004 and 2005 there was a seven per cent fall in the developed nations median road death rate per 100,000 population, but Australian’s rate rose two per cent.
There are lots and lots of data that you can find here, but it all goes to show the current road safety policy is failing. Only yesterday we wrote about higher not deterring motorists from committing further driving offenses.
If you are interested in learning a new approach to road safety, you can do yourself a favour and check out RoadSense.com.au - an non profitable organization outlining the facts, based on Government data, as to how and why the current policy has failed, how we are being mislead (speed kills) and what needs to be done to save lives on our roads.
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May 24th, 2007 at 5:08 pm
Okay thats cool we are ranked 11th ? Now take out 10 countries that have Black ice,snow and blizzards and is dark for most of the year? Now where do we stand? Ummmmm hmmm interseting…
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May 24th, 2007 at 5:59 pm
lol germany has high speed autobahns and have quite a low death toll
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May 24th, 2007 at 7:34 pm
Cheers Alborz, I came across somehing like this years ago and then forgot where I found it. It does amaze me that the UK Beat Germany. Germany has been long admired as having the strictest driving standards in europe.
Well spotted Sam, its not speed that kills but lack of training and driver education.
I don’t know if its still the case, but in Germany they use to have a limit for the number of test failures you could have. IE fail your test more than 6 times and its good bye your not going to drive in this country!
But what about the US!! No wonder they are pushing for ESP to be mandatory.
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May 24th, 2007 at 7:43 pm
With all the Nanny controls they put on cars and the amount of speed cameras compared to years ago it is clearly more training. Also when we were kids learning to drive the cars were slower and more crude. I mean you knew you were doing 100 mph then, very scary. Not so now though for kids.Some tyres were only speed rated to 180 klm an hour so any faster the rubber would peel off. They get off their Play Stations and think they can drive the same. We mostly drove around in old clunkers and now kids at 18 are driving high peformance cars. I mean my son is 22 and has lost his licence from speeding 3 times!!! It seems everything else is changing to prevent deaths except for MORE training for the younger ones. Each state has their own rules for L&P platers. I wonder which state is doing the best for deaths as far as percentages? There is just so much to say on this subject.
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May 26th, 2007 at 12:05 am
Bavarian Missile said, “With all the Nanny controls they put on cars and the amount of speed cameras” compared to years ago it is clearly more training.
Training the “Key” word, most parents cant drive properly, so how is the new L driver suppose to learn, for fuck sake, you don’t even have to speak English these days, they will interprete for you, getting your Licence these days is way to easy, and speed camera’s, what a joke, yea they catch the driver doing 80km in a 60 zone, “FLASH” you have just been court, but then you crashed just up the road, when you failed to respond to the car pulling out, you lost control of your fantastic brand new car, because you believe it would be the car that would do the crash avoiding, and you the driver would be alright, because you spent a shit load of cash on your new car, guess what you have just killed the other person, WHY? because you were speeding, and even at 60 you would of still crashed because you cant drive, most car drivers are so dumb these days, and have little, or no control skills what soever, proper compulsory driver training, is the only way forward, make it harder, 3 strikes and you simply cant get your licence, speed controls in cars, that are not controlled by the driver, no English, no licence, 98% pass rate, 100% on driver’s test, no suspension, how about loose licence, then you have to go for it again, i have often thought, no full comp insurance, you crash, your fault, you pay, that would make people think about there abilities, and how careful they are.
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May 27th, 2007 at 8:24 am
No Govt will ever have the balls to implement compulsory driver training, the incoming log book is the closest they have come to promoting professionism in 30 years that I know of. The real problem is after a test is passed the standard of driving starts to slide downhill. Retesting every 5 years would promote keeping up to date with road law and it would make people understand that a Licence is a privilege not a right.
Just a side note: QT in it’s wisdom has done away with the need to answer questions to renew a Learners Licence if a permit or licence has been held within the last 5 years. If anyone looses their licence it is now called suspended and is handed back at the end. No retests, no questions and it doesn’t even need to be handed in anymore, you just are supposed to know not to drive.
Now don’t tell me they are interested in road safety cos this proves otherwise.
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February 10th, 2008 at 8:27 pm
I came to Australia 1 1/2 years ago from london and I thought thank god no more road rage ,hardly any cars on the road great.
What abunch of w****** west australian drivers are They are like abunch of lemmings determined to kill them selves . Most people drive up the next cars arse so in the event of an emergency bang .OH was I to close.
Kids pass there test jump straight into a hugely powerful car because full cover insurance is not compulsery. (that would stop most of them buying v8’s if the premiums were high)
Then Comes drinking and driving .What sort of deterant is a 3 month ban if you are caught give them 18months to 2 years and take there cars then all of a sudden the death toll will start to drop .
As for the police and there tactics get real we all know its a big money making scheme with your speed camera’s .
Why don’t you bite the bullet and stop getting rich on your ever increasing fines and actually try and do something really constructive to bring the road death toll down! and be applauded .
P.S England has around 70 million people it is on tenth the size of w.a with atleast 10 to 20 times as many cars per equal sized town area yet there is a lot less road deaths.
peoples attitudes have to change on the road or they need to be forced I think forced is the only option.
Happy driving
PPS I bet you are thinking bloody poms but you know what I’m saying would make a huge difference.
chris in W.A
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August 14th, 2008 at 9:40 am
Hi,
I live in Gettitindya and our roads are crazy. They are crowded, small and windey, and are full of cow carrying bicycles and watermelon-eating women. When you attempt to drive on these roads it is nearly impossible to get to your destination without crashing into ceiling cows or smelly men. The weather is hot and sticky, and melted ice-cream is smeared all over some parts of the road. It is horrible and needs to change.
Regards Koochlarni Higgitagala
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September 9th, 2008 at 5:45 pm
I think these numbers are far too high, most of them are probably caused by drunk drivers. These people should not be getting behind the wheel in the state they are in, especially if they know that they are well over the limit and cannot talk properly. The people who cause the accidents are just stupid and do not know what they are doing, they are putting themself and others at risk.
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