Division(s): All	

	ITEM BV11

BEST VALUE COMMITTEE – 14 APRIL 2004

OUTLINE SCOPING DOCUMENT FOR
BEST VALUE REVIEW OF ROAD CASUALTY REDUCTION

Report by Head of Transport, Environment & Economy

Name of Review

Road Casualty Reduction Best Value Review

Planned Date of Final Report

December 2004 

Review Team Members

John Disley			Transport Policy Group Manager (Review Team Leader)
Cllr Brian Hodgson 		(Designated Member Representative)
Geoff Barrell 			OCC – Accident Investigation and Prevention Team
Anthony Kirkwood		OCC – Accident Investigation and Prevention Team
Ian Harris			OCC – Education, Training, and Publicity Team
John Lloyd			OCC - Fire and Rescue
Adrian Sell/Debbie Fox		Performance Review Officers
Malcolm Collis 			Thames Valley Police Traffic Management Unit (Partner)
Barbara Foster			Safer Roads [Speed Camera] Partnership (Partner)
Roger Woodward		Worcestershire County Council (External Challenge)
Steve Proctor			Director, TMS Consultancy (External Challenge)

The Advisory Group membership is listed in Annex 1.

Executive Summary

Casualty reduction was subject to a pilot best value review in 1999 which recommended minor detailed changes to working practices. In September 2003 Council voted to conduct a Road Casualty Reduction with the Best Value Committee resolving that the review should report in December 2004. The overall aim of the review is to explore how we can maximise casualty reduction within our current means, both by factors we control and by ways we can influence other bodies. The review will also suggest the likely effect of additional resources on reducing casualties. 

Description and Components of Areas under Review

Areas Under Direct Control 	Areas We Can Influence	Outside Our Influence	
Road Safety Policy / Planning	Police Enforcement	Demographics	
Accident Data Collation	Safer Roads Partnership		
Engineering – new works	Health Service		
Engineering – maintenance 	Vehicle Standards		
Education, Training, & Publicity (ETP)	Legal/Enforcement Framework		
Fire & Rescue	Govt. Education Policies		
Learning & Culture			

Road safety engineering and ETP functions now fall within the Transport Policy Group to ensure safety is planned and integrated within the wider transport role. It is proposed that the review should use the following broad headings and SWOT analyses to review each component area:

•	Areas of activity 
•	Methods 
•	Budgets and Resources

Accident Data Collation

The national accident reporting system in the UK is specified by the Department for Transport, (DfT) and is subject to periodic review (a standing committee including police and local authority representatives in addition to DfT staff oversees this process). In the Thames Valley Police area, additional data over and above that required by the national reporting system is collected to assist in particular the work of the highway authorities to fulfil their duties to reduce road injuries. 

Engineering – New Works

Engineering and accident analysis are undertaken by the Accident Investigation and Prevention (AIP) Team with an establishment of 2.5 full time equivalent (FTE) staff and 1 post dedicated to accident data processing located with the team. The Council’s capital programme for 2004/05 as represented graphically in Annex 2 for improving highway infrastructure supports a wide range of objectives, including road safety. 

The Casualty Reduction Scheme programme with a budget of around £1m (speed camera costs - estimated at £110,000 in 2004/05 - are funded from fines income) is specifically targeted at addressing sites, routes and areas with road casualty problems. The programme consists of highway improvement works and a Speed Management Strategy comprising speed limits and supporting measures where appropriate. Many other programme sub divisions also have the potential to reduce the number and severity of casualties (for example the Community Safety, Integrated Transport Strategies, Better Ways to School etc.), and one of the key roles for the team is also to help ensure that the maximum safety benefits are also obtained from these areas of work (and also that areas of potential conflict between objectives are minimised). The team also manages safety audit in which all new schemes are checked to help ensure safety problems are minimised.

The Council also has an important role in guiding the design of new highways arising from residential and commercial developments; road safety is a key consideration in this process.

Engineering – Maintenance 

The Highway Maintenance programme clearly also has a role in supporting safety objectives; areas of particular relevance include:

•	Provision of adequate skid resistance
•	Provision of adequate drainage
•	Provision of adequate surface quality (e.g. minimizing defects such as rutting and other surface irregularities, potholes etc)
•	Maintenance of street lighting, signs, road markings etc
•	Grass cutting etc to maintain visibility 
•	Winter maintenance  

Education, Training, and Publicity

The Road Safety Education, Training and Publicity (ETP) Team with a budget around £93,000 have a head office staff level of 6 FTE and several paid part-time co-ordinators. Safety promotion in the field by such measures as speed indicator devices (SIDs) is undertaken by 5 FTE staff and all these costs including salaries are funded from speed camera fines revenue (around £0.25m). The ETP programme comprises a wide range of activities addressing specific behavioural matters and training needs to improve safety. The activities are regularly reviewed to identify the areas of work that are likely to yield the greatest benefit from the available staff and financial resources. Major areas of activity include:

•	Pedestrian training
•	Cyclist training
•	Support of Driver Improvement scheme
•	Promotion of cycle helmets
•	Promotion of correct use of child car seats
•	Speed awareness (through a wide range of activities)
•	Alcohol and drug awareness
•	Support for road users with specific needs ( e.g. older motorists)
•	Other activities addressing specific behavioural matters e.g. driver fatigue / seat belt usage

Much of the work is carried out in partnership with other County Council departments (in particular Learning and Culture in respect of work with school pupils, and Fire and Rescue in respect of child car seats etc) and other organisations including Thames Valley Police, the Thames Valley Safer Roads Partnership and the Health Service. It is also worth noting that the contribution of volunteers – particularly in the context of child pedestrian and cyclist training – is crucial to the successful delivery of the service. 

Fire & Rescue

The number of accidents attended, where road users are trapped in vehicles or where there is a fire hazard, spillage etc. is now comparable to the number of incidents involving fires. The service also works in partnership with the Education, Training and Publicity team in a number of activities as referred to above. Performance improvements will not affect accident numbers but are likely to influence the fatal/serious split. 

Learning & Culture

There are references to road safety education in the national curriculum but it remains a voluntary activity for schools at the discretion of head teachers and governors.  As a result it has not been possible to establish a consistent road safety education programme across the county. 
 
Enforcement – Thames Valley Police and Thames Valley Safer Roads Partnership

Enforcement is vital to ensure respect for traffic laws directed at road safety, including those addressing:

•	speeding
•	compliance with traffic signals (and other traffic restrictions – e.g. banned turns) 
•	general standards of driving 
•	alcohol or drug impairment
•	medical fitness to drive 
•	working hours for drivers
•	vehicle maintenance , loading etc
•	seat belt usage (currently high priority)
•	mobile phone use (currently high priority)

Safer Roads Partnership (Speed Cameras)

This Council is an active participant in the Thames Valley Safer Roads Partnership and has developed with them (in addition to the core activity of camera enforcement) a number of innovative activities such as Route Alert to inform drivers of the dangers posed by speeding and other hazards. It should however be noted that the Partnership has to operate to strict Government guidelines in order to use fines revenue for funding all speed camera operations and additional measures to promote casualty reduction. 

Health Service

The Health Service clearly has a vital role in treating those injured in road accidents. Their timely intervention and treatment – and in the attendance by ambulance service at the scene of accidents – may often literally be life saving, and also reduce the long term consequences of the injuries sustained. 

There are also numerous ways in which the work of the health service can assist accident prevention; for example the service is actively involved in the dissemination of the child pedestrian programme developed by the County Council. The Council has also undertaken work with the local Health Service Trusts to use A&E records to identify road accidents not reported to the police, although this work is still at a very early stage. We have also used postcode information to identify the most vulnerable areas in order to help target education and training.

A source has stated that physical trauma care is not good in the UK in comparison with countries such as the USA, however specialists are beginning to promote this aspect of care which is likely to be able to reduce accident severity in some cases.

There is scope for more accident prevention work but a strong desire amongst some staff to increase their role is hampered by a lack of direction and resources. Difficulties with the new Primary Care Trust boundaries and the Department of Health’s differing priorities and targets to the DfT are also having an adverse effect. 

Vehicle Standards

Improvements to vehicle design have led to major improvements in both primary and secondary (post impact) safety as a result of both the regulatory framework within the EU and commercial pressures. However technological advances still offer significant scope for further improvements. However, the use of speed as a positive factor in marketing vehicles still gives much concern, particularly in respect of motorcycles, where there has been an appreciable growth in the number of very high powered machines.

Legal/Enforcement Framework

We can, as part of the Local Government Association present our findings and lobby for any changes we deem necessary in the legal framework.

Government Education Policies

There is no statutory obligation to teach road safety in schools and although the DfT state that road safety education is important there is little specific good practice guidance.

Demographics

Accident statistics will naturally be affected by changing demography such as population growth and the age structure of the population, particularly the increasing numbers of elderly road users; an awareness of such changes can help target education. 

Performance against Targets and Comparison with Others

The broad principles for conducting reviews are: 

Challenge - There is already a high degree of interaction between professionals in their respective fields, both from other Authorities and others within the profession. The Review Group is fortunate to have gained the services of a colleague from Worcestershire, a similar county to Oxfordshire who were commended to us by the DfT on the strength of their road safety record. A director of a leading road safety and traffic management consultancy with wide experience of casualty reduction across the UK and overseas is also on the Review Team.

Compare - Comparison is the means by which we can establish whether the challenge is valid. Casualty reduction engineering success is measured by well established accident record monitoring and although inevitably many accidents are not reported it does provide a good relative measure of success. Comprehensive national accident data is published by the DfT. For education, publicity and training, we can measure input but output is much more difficult to gauge and compare especially in the short to medium term.  We already liaise and compare closely with other authorities over casualty reduction aspects including accident data collation, accident patterns, scheme design, public attitudes and educational campaigns.  However there may be scope to increase discussion with others over the accident reduction potential of allied aspects such as highway maintenance and capital programmes.

Consult - The Advisory Group will be widely used for consultation, the group’s range of expertise should ensure that ideas not only receive expert consideration but also fresh and questioning analysis from those not directly in that field. Views from the Citizens Panel will be sought during the review. The Oxford Times editor declined to join the Review Team for fear of appearing biased to the readership but has agreed to publicise the process.  

Compete – Statutory duties effectively require Highway Authorities to maintain an internal Client. This Council follows common practice in outsourcing most engineering design to consultants. Although not common practice there is potential to out-source other discrete elements of work such as accident data entry and analysis.

National Casualty Reduction Targets 

Oxfordshire County Council has adopted the national casualty reduction targets (set in 2000) for the year 2010. Annex 3 outlines recent performance both in respect of the targets and the current Best Value Performance Indicator No. 99 (BVPI 99) for casualty reduction. BVPIs are government measures gauging Local Authority performance over their range of functions. 

Progress in terms of casualty reduction can be measured in absolute or comparative terms. The former is difficult to gauge due to the scale of the problem in terms of the relatively small sums targeted to it. Comparative measurement of performance judged against previous years and other authorities is perhaps a more useful indicator as it gives a clearer picture of progress against budget input. Large sums poorly targeted can still bring absolute benefits whist very small sums no matter how well directed will make little difference in absolute terms.   The Government has set casualty reduction targets against base period between 1994 and 1998 of 40% for fatal and serious injuries (50% for children) and 10% for slight injuries. Oxfordshire has set additional targets to reduce pedestrian and cyclist injuries by 10%. The Best Value performance indicator No 99 broadly reflects these targets and for the current year measures percentage change against the baseline and the previous year.

Environment in which Casualty Reduction Operates

Although our practices are deemed to meet statutory requirements and accident statistics give an objective measure of success in casualty reduction they do not give the whole story. Equality issues arise as certain sections of the community are particularly vulnerable to injury due to their mode of travel or socio-economic group. Accessibility problems generally affect the same categories of road user; accident records can mask such facts as safety fears preventing preferred choices of transport modes and geographic areas of travel.   The Crime and Disorder Act 1998 prompted the Community Safety initiative whereby the fears and aspirations of communities are sought and acted upon; feedback invariably suggests road safety is the biggest concern overriding other issues such as burglary. In addition to Environment and Economy several other directorates work with each other and various external partners to reduce road casualties. 

Safeguarding our Communities is one of the 5 strategic objectives of the Oxfordshire Plan which prioritises road safety by meeting scheme provision and casualty reduction targets. The government has assigned standard costs to accidents depending on their severity and the environment where they occurred, these reflect an estimate of the true cost of slight and serious injuries but add a factor for suffering and lost production in the case of fatal accidents.

Consultation and Client Satisfaction

Consultation over the review itself is considered above.  Consultation, both internal and external, over schemes and initiatives can be broken down into three main types:

•	Where there is a statutory requirement for consultation to take place
•	Where there is a legitimate expectation by the public for consultation to take place
•	Where it is discretionary as to if consultation needs to take place at all

Any aspect affecting the highway and driving habits is bound to create widespread interest and comment; consequently consultation is extensive. We consult both those likely to be more directly affected by proposals and the general public. In 2003 our MORI residents poll found that road safety was the biggest worry identified with 83% of respondents expressing concern. Much staff time is spent liaising with the public and elected bodies over specific schemes and general initiatives. 

Casualty reduction measures provoke a mixture of public opinion. Although most claim casualty reduction is important, there are widely differing views on how we achieve it and how much we should sacrifice to maximise it. This is perhaps also evident in the gap between stated priorities and budget allocated by Government, possibly mindful of the electoral power of the motoring lobby. Additionally opinions vary between different road user groups. There is a possible further paradox in many people supporting measures where they live yet opposing those that adversely affect them elsewhere. Policies encouraging sustainable transport create more potentially vulnerable road users; this can lead to debate both with the public and by transport professionals.  

National media has been hostile to many casualty reduction initiatives although a balance is returning. It is difficult to identify whether the media reflects or creates public opinion. Thanks in part to careful liaison the local media is generally more balanced.

Issues Identified from PEST Analysis

Political: 
•	Commitment to introducing and supporting measures to promote road safety (especially in the context of vocal lobby groups – e.g. policy on use of speed cameras, control of access to high power motorcycles, alterations to drink drive limit)
•	Commitment to changing balance of use of different transport modes in pursuit of e.g. sustainability 
•	EU proposals to impose stricter driver licensing regulations 

Economic:
•	Affordability of different transport modes and overall travel demand.
•	Turnover of vehicle stock – newer vehicles tend to have appreciably better primary and secondary safety characteristics which help protect occupants and pedestrians respectively.

Social:
•	Demographic factors 
-	age structure of population (numbers in high risk age bands)
-	change in population characteristics – e.g. changes in numbers of population unfamiliar with UK road environment through e.g. EU enlargement 
•	change in use of and attitudes to alcohol / drugs etc
•	changes in lifestyle characteristics (e.g. recent study highlights prevalence of sleep deprivation among young adults measurably impairing driver performance)

Technical:
•	Developments in vehicle safety characteristics
•	Developments in detection and enforcement of driving offences
•	Developments in road surfacing techniques and materials
•	Vehicle speed limiters including possible use with driving offenders

Issues Identified from SWOT Analysis

The following list is a general SWOT analysis of services directly under OCC control. An example of a more detailed SWOT breakdown for accident data processing and analysis is included in Annex 4. Similar detailed studies will be undertaken for each area under our control or influence as a key element early in the review.

Strengths:
•	Both the engineering and ETP services directed at reducing casualty numbers and severity do appear to have been effective. A large number of engineering schemes have been monitored and show substantial and sustained reductions in casualty numbers. Although it is far harder to identify the casualty reduction benefits of ETP work, a large number of road users are targeted, and this work is regularly reviewed and adapted.
•	Delivery of many of the individual components of the above work are generally recognised to be of very high quality, and in addition to using established techniques, both the engineering and ETP work have embraced innovative techniques such as the South Oxfordshire rural 30 limits and speed-reactive signs, often involving external partners.

Weaknesses:
•	Co-ordination of activity impacting on road safety - both within Environment & Economy (E&E) - and between E&E and other departments – has frequently been insufficient to optimise casualty reduction. 
•	Shortage of staff has hampered the delivery of some services (for example in fulfilling obligations to maintain fixed site speed cameras and in failing to complete all schemes within the Casualty Reduction Programme).

Opportunities:
•	There is considerable potential to improve co-ordination with other E&E areas of work, and with other departments and also external organisations and agencies.

Threats:
•	Although there is still much that can be done to further reduce the number of road deaths and injuries, many of the factors influencing safety lie largely or wholly beyond the control of the County Council, and this would leave open the possibility that lack of progress in the latter could negate or minimise the benefits we can achieve through the former.
•	Motoring lobby groups and a media hostile to casualty reduction initiatives such as lower limits and speed cameras can jeopardise our ability to reduce casualties.

Issues Identified for Further Review 

Key Priority Issues

Much of the capital transport programme’s potential to reduce casualty numbers and severity is not being fully realised.  It is important to ensure that the maximum safety benefits are obtained and areas of potential conflict between objectives are minimised. We need to investigate how to best increase the influence of road safety work on capital and highway maintenance programmes by such measures as earlier liaison using robust data and best practice evidence.  

It appears casualty reduction can be helped by the considerable potential to improve co-ordination not only with other E&E areas of work but also with other departments and external organisations.

There appears to be scope for greater casualty reduction by improved maintenance, both by maintaining specific casualty reduction schemes and by ensuring maintenance such as adequate surfacing and vegetation trimming is targeted to emerging problem sites. 

There is strong evidence to suggest that tougher licensing laws and firmer enforcement of road traffic regulations will have a major beneficial effect on casualty reduction. Although such proposals have been under consideration for a long time all governments have been reluctant to implement such changes. 

Priority Issues

•	Accident Data Analysis – can data be used more effectively to target funding and to monitor the effect of existing schemes?

•	Speed Management Strategy – can this and other generic measures offer the significant accident reduction potential within current funding levels that they appear to? 

•	Staff Shortage  - has hampered the delivery of some services such as fulfilling obligations to maintain fixed site speed cameras and in failing to complete all schemes within the Casualty Reduction Programme.  Consider investigating additional skills needed and how they should be focussed.

•	Attitude Changes – much depends on what proposals the public will tolerate, we need to ascertain whether the views held in this county are typical and what we can do to influence them where necessary. A combination of sympathetic engineering and focused education could help create more acceptance by the electorate and media for:
•	Lower speed limits meeting a national speed management strategy framework?
•	increased use of available and developing enforcement technology for speed limits and other controls?
•	greater control of access to high risk transport such as high power motorcycles
•	alterations to drink drive limit?
•	change in habits and attitudes to alcohol / drugs / seatbelts / mobile phones / driver fatigue while using the road?

Secondary Issues

•	Health Service Liaison – while there is potential for greater casualty reduction from increased partnership working the extra county resources required to overcome cultural and priority differences suggest this would not be a priority for targeting resources.

•	Vehicle Standards – vehicle safety design is improving rapidly due to legislation and marketing pressures and there would appear to be little this Authority could do to enhance the process. 

•	Speed as a Media Marketing Tool - this is seen as detrimental and our Trading Standards group can uphold complaints, however it is something we will be unlikely to exert strong influence over aside from working to change attitudes as outlined above. 

•	Legal/Enforcement Framework and Government Education Policies – we will continue to voice concerns where appropriate but our influence is unlikely to be increased by diverting additional resources to this task.

•	Demographics – although we can continue to use demographic data to target educational campaigns there is little scope for casualty reduction by  extra activity in this direction.

•	Equality and Accessibility Issues - continue to be considered within the road safety field but there is little scope for increased casualty reduction by diverting more resources to this area. 

Project Brief

•	The Review Group should consider all issues identified for further review and prioritise the key issues. 

•	The Review Group should briefly discuss secondary issues to ensure no significant casualty reduction potential has been overlooked.

•	For each issue the Review Group should call not only on appropriate Advisory Group members but also on pertinent internal staff to debate the issues thoroughly.

•	For each topic a paper outlining concerns, aspirations and potential solutions under consideration should be circulated to all parties to permit familiarity with the issues before debate.

•	Progress could be reported to the Best Value Committee once significant debate has been undertaken on groups of issues, possibly reporting at key points before the final report is due in December.
 
Glossary
See Annex 5

DAVID McKIBBIN
Head of Transport, Environment & Economy

Background papers:	Casualty Report 2002 and Road Safety Plan 2003/04

Contact Officers:	Geoff Barrell  Tel: 810450
			John Disley    Tel 810460

1April 2004.

ANNEX 1
Advisory Group

Pat Mulvihill
	Principal Engineer	Maintenance	
Dave Clee
	Engineer	Worcestershire County Council	
John Rider	Thames Valley Transport Team Leader	Government Office for the South East (GOSE)
	
Paul Robinson
	Network Manager	Highways Agency	
John Hollis
	Head of Government and Industrial Affairs
	BMW Oxford	
Julia Lindon
	Claims Manager	Oxford Bus Company	
Martin Sutton
	Managing Director	Stagecoach Bus Company	
James Dawton
	Right to Ride Representative	Cyclists Touring Club	
Paige Mitchell
	Co-coordinator	The Slower Speeds Initiative	
Corinne Grimley Evans
	Representative	Oxford Pedestrian Association	
Nigel Taylor	Secretary	Thames Valley Advanced Motorcyclists	

Potential Advisory Group Members

Learning & Culture	Awaiting response
	
Community Safety Representative	To be approached
	
Health Authority	To be approached
	
Brake (casualty reduction charity)
	To be approached	
Frank McKenna	Reading University Professor and acknowledged expert in driver attitudes and behaviour. Would need to pay for his time so consider inviting if need arises	

Declined Involvement

AA Foundation for Road Safety Research
	Too small an organisation to afford staff time	
RAC Foundation for Motoring
	Too small an organisation to afford staff time	
Oxford Times Newspaper	Prefer to watch from the outside rather than be involved as readers have particularly diverse views on road safety. Appreciate that the media can play a big part in road safety education and, if this issue crops up as part of the review, would be happy to give input.
	
Royal Society for Prevention of Accidents (RoSPA)	Cannot afford time	
ANNEX 2

              

Annex 3
Oxfordshire Road Casualties

a)	Casualty totals: 2003 compared 1994/98 baseline and 2002

1994/98	2002		2003

Fatal	57	37	65
Serious	475	464	417
Slight	2963	2830	2474

Total	3495	3331	2956

Note that we are still waiting for the outcome of investigations into two fatal accidents in 2003 currently included in the above table that may subsequently be identified as either suicide or natural causes. It is also possible that some minor additions / amendments to the data will be continue to be made in the next few months so the above data should be regarded as provisional (although any changes should make no material difference to the analysis given below).

b)	Percentage change in casualties: 2003 compared with 1994/98 baseline and 2002: 

2003					2003
	    % change on 1994/98 baseline		   % change on 2002
			
All ksi			-10%					-4%	
Child ksi		(-43%)*					(-3%)*
Slight injuries		-17%					-13%

Total			-15%					-11%

*child ksi totals are low and care should be taken in interpreting this data (taking account also the uncertainty over estimating the 1994/98 baseline totals).

c)	BVPI99 (casualty rates per 100,000 population) 

Year	Pedestrian	Pedal Cyclist	Powered 	Car	Other Users	
	ksi
	slight	ksi	slight	Two Wheeler	ksi	slight	ksi	slight	
					ksi	slight					
2000	10.2	33.9	6.8	43.6	15.4	38.7	47.8	329.1	6.0	38.7	
2001	8.7	32.7	5.9	41.4	13.7	37.1	51.2	326.3	6.6	37.0	
2002	10.5	30.3	5.4	41.2	16.5	38.2	44.0	323.1	6.1	33.1	
2003	9.8	29.8	4.9	45.1	18.5	34.8	41.5	264.4	3.8	30.3	

The charts below show the data in the table graphically along with projections of the BVPI99 totals between 2000 and 2010 that would be required to meet the 2010 target (on the assumption that the casualty reductions are evenly split between all road user groups - the upper and lower dashed lines show the typical year to year variability in the BVPI figure to assist interpretation of the data)

DfT have recently consulted on simplifying the BVPI99 to comprise just the information shown in b) above, although it is likely that the assessment of slight injuries will be based on changes to the injury rates per million vehicle km, rather than the absolute numbers of slight injuries (i.e. to tie in with the 2010 target for slight injuries).

d)	
Comparison with other authorities 

National data for 2003 will not be available till around June 2004, and so the national comparative information shown on pages 3 and 4 of the OCC Casualty Report for 2002 is the latest currently available.

The charts below however provide a further illustration of Oxfordshire’s performance in relation to other authorities in England in progressing to the 2010 overall ksi and slight injury rate targets (i.e. the likely form of the new BVPI99). For the reasons outlined on page 3 of the Casualty Report, performance on the ksi target is substantially below average (though we are slightly better than average in respect of the slight injury rate).

e)	Local comparisons

Provisional data for 2003 is however available for all of the Thames Valley Police area:
			
			      2003: percent change on 2002
	
			ksi		slight		total

Other TVP 		-17%		-7%		-8%
Oxfordshire		-4%		-13%		-11%

It is disappointing to see that the reductions in ksi totals seen elsewhere in the TVP area were not matched in Oxfordshire, although overall reductions in injuries were slightly better.

Note that the recent trends in the TVP area have resulted in some discussions between the local authorities, police and DfT over the comprehensiveness and reliability of the data; while the outcome to date is that there are no obvious reasons for reporting rates etc to have changed, this matter will continue to be investigated to help verify the reliability of the casualty data for the past 12 months

f)	Casualties to date in 2004

While it is obviously far too early to make anything other than very generalised comments, thankfully both in Oxfordshire and the whole TVP area, road deaths to date have been well down on the 2003 total (in Oxfordshire, the total is less than half that for the same period in 2003).

Current recorded ksi and slight injuries for the first two months of 2004 are also well down on the same period in 2003, and although this picture will change to some extent as ‘late arrival’ forms are received, the picture does look encouraging (though see last paragraph of above section).

g)	Discussion

Overall, the trend in road casualties appears to be downwards for most road user groups. However, as already mentioned in para d) above), we are always likely to struggle to match national performance in respect of overall ksi's due to the comparatively low numbers of such injuries in the 1994/98 baseline period; further work on presenting this information will perhaps be advisable if the DfT do adopt the revisions to the BVPI99 as outlined above.

The apparent recent differences in ksi trends within the TVP area are a matter of concern, and this will be monitored closely in the coming months.

ANNEX 4

Example Swot Analysis 

Accident Data Processing and Analysis 

Strengths: 
•	accident data processing: external customers (Thames Valley Police and Department for Transport) highly satisfied with service.
•	accident data analysis: good procedures in place to identify accident problem sites and routes meriting further investigation.
•	scheme monitoring: good procedures in place to track effects of engineering schemes (which in turn provides very helpful information to guide choice / design of new schemes.

Weaknesses:
•	none currently identified in terms of procedures; pressures on staff resources from time to time mean that not all elements of this work are fully up to date.

Opportunities:
•	the procedures are from time to time reviewed; there may be opportunities to improve some work elements e.g. through enhancing ICT provision / training

Threats:
•	no appreciable threats are currently identified; staff resources – taking account of the demands placed by other areas of work – are however stretched and it is essential that the current vacancy in the team is filled.

ANNEX 5
Glossary of Terms

AIP	Accident Investigation and Prevention (using engineering solutions) – generally refers to engineering team within OCC 
	
Advisory Group	A pool of expertise the Review Team is able to draw on when needed
	
BVPI 99	Best Value Performance Indicator  Number 99
	
Casualties	Number of people injured rather than number of accidents
	
DfT	Department for Transport  (was DoT then DETR)
	
ETP	Education, Training, and Publicity -generally refers to team within OCC
	
E&E	Environment and Economy Directorate
	
External Challenge	Members of Review Team or elsewhere who challenge current OCC practices
	
FTE
	Full Time Equivalent	
GOSE	Government Office for the South East
	
KSI	Killed and Seriously Injured – fatal and serious accidents categories often grouped together and differentiated from Slight accidents 
	
PEST	Political, Economic, Social, Technical  
	
PCT	Primary Care Trust – current organisational structure of the Health Service
	
PTW
	Powered Two Wheeler (i.e. motorcycle, moped, scooter)	
Review Team	Small team who meet regularly to administer and progress the review under guidance of Best Value Committee
	
Safer Roads Partnership	Oxfordshire County Council, Thames Valley Police, and others have formed this Body to operate speed cameras in accordance with government guidelines
	
SWOT	Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats
	
TVP	Thames Valley Police