Finnish MEP and former world rally champion Ari Vatanen says politicians and the public must work hard together to reduce road deaths. David Labanyi reports
If the prime minister of each of the 25-EU member states were to lose a child in a crash, the issue of road safety would finally get the political attention that it deserves, a Finnish MEP has said.
While Ari Vatanen admits that as a former world rally champion, "I like speed in cars, obviously", he believes the drip-drip nature of road deaths in different countries means the problem remains low on the political agenda.
"When I was a boy I was with my family in a motor car when my father was killed. I remember him leaning against the steering wheel, that anxiety. I am sure that experience has left me with a bigger internal handicap than I dare to admit," he said.
He says the slow response from individual European nations to road deaths and injuries is because each fatal crash is an "isolated human tragedy, just one family crying here, another family crying there."
In his office in Strasbourg, Mr Vatanen explains the political indifference to the cause of death for 40,000 EU citizens every year. "Why do we do so little? Why do we spend so little on road safety? It is because it is not the Concorde which crashes, it is not the pride of the UK and France which crashes.
"When that happened all Concordes were grounded immediately. No stone was left unturned in seeking to remedy the problem. But when it comes to traffic safety - nothing. And that is a conscious decision."
"So let's look at France. Since Nicolas Sarkozy [the French Interior Minister] and Chirac got involved in this issue and started taking it seriously, the numbers killed on French roads has fallen from 8,000 to 5,000 per year.
"This has been brought about by a change in the psychology of the driver. Drivers have changed their behaviour because they now fear being caught."
Ari Vatanen recently produced an ambitious programme of measures aimed at halving the number of road deaths in the EU to 20,000 by 2010.
He estimates the cost of road crashes on Europe at €200 billion, or 2 per cent of GNP. Road crashes are the primary cause of death for the under-50s in the EU.
This programme has been adopted by the European Parliament.
It requires increased enforcement and improved car and road design and a greater use of technology. Driver education and the introduction of a European driving licence are among the recommendations.
The report also called for special training for motorcyclists, who have a fatality rate 17 times higher than car drivers. Mr Vatanen is also in favour of a maximum alcohol limit of 0.5 mg/ml which would be lower than the 0.8 mg/ml limit in Ireland.
The MEP is also keen to see improved cross-border enforcement of traffic laws with the introduction of a uniform system which would allow authorities in one member state to prosecute drivers who break the law from another.
He points to Britain and Sweden as examples of current best practice in road safety. "If every EU state were to achieve a reduction in deaths as seen in those countries, fatalities would fall by 17,000 a year.
"If everybody wore a seat belt, complied with the legal speed limits and did not drive under the influence of alcohol, fatalities would be cut by more than 60 per cent. However, enforcement is mainly an issue for the member states.
"Ireland is like Finland, we both live in the shadow of a larger country that is doing much better with road safety and we can learn from them," he said.
Mr Vatanen is opposed to funding rail services, believing that this merely diverts money badly needed for investment in motorway and roads. "Traffic is like plumbing, you have to open up the bottlenecks. We should be diverting money currently being spent on rails to roads because people operate as a web.
"They live in one place, work in another, socialise somewhere else and then there are children and so on, but not all on the same street. So it is a web and so roads are at the heart of society."
Asked whether it was possible or sustainable for member states to continually expand their road networks to meet constantly-rising demand, Mr Vatanen said not only could this be done, but it was vital to ensure the future competitiveness of the EU.
"We have to ask, how are we using money in the member states? We must go for an open network of roads across the member states if we want the EU to be competitive. And for this we need sophisticated traffic management systems."
He is enthusiastic about the benefits offered by new technologies. "I take my hat off to the engineers. Electronic stability control, speed limitation systems and seat belt reminders, all of these reduce crashes and cut the number of deaths when collisions happen.
"But the installation of these kinds of products is lagging behind the need. We need to encourage member states to moderinise their car fleets.
"Let's take Sweden. Their car fleet is newer. Newer cars are safer and less likely to end up in a crash. In Sweden they are applying EU rules."
He said that at the moment the EU can only offer research mainly through the Commission's Community Road Accident Database (CARE) and place requirements on car manufacturers or importers.
"The difference can only be made at the level of member states. MEPS can provoke things, make suggestions but the real change comes from the member states."
He thinks the target of halving the death toll on European roads within five years is realistic. "Progress is being made, deaths are falling. If politicians and the public work hard together we will achieve our goal."