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The Australian New Car Assessment Program (ANCAP), in cooperation with the country's auto clubs, including insurer RACT, has rolled out a new campaign to encourage community conversation and consideration of safer vehicle choices to reduce fatal and serious crashes.
ANCAP's “Safer Vehicle Choices Save Lives” campaign draws upon the group's analysis of Australian- and New Zealand-registered light-vehicle fleets, which revealed an over-representation of older vehicles in fatal vehicle crashes and the increasing average age of vehicles involved in fatal crashes.
The analysis showed that the rate of fatal crashes per registered vehicle for the oldest vehicles is four times higher than that of the newest vehicles. Vehicles built in 2001 or earlier accounted for 20% of the Australian vehicle fleet, but are involved in 36% of fatalities, while vehicles built between 2012 and 2017 accounted for 31% of the fleet, but are involved in a mere 12% of fatalities.
“Tasmania has the oldest vehicle fleet in Australia, approximately 12.8 years compared to the national average of 9.8 years,” said Stacey Pennicott, RACT executive general manager for membership and community. “Combine this with recent road-crash statistics from the Department of State Growth that show very little improvement in the number of fatal and serious crashes in Tasmania in the past 10 years, and we are seeing an alarming trend that we are very keen to address. The ANCAP campaign highlights the difference in safety features between a 1998 vehicle and a 2015 vehicle and brings in a human element that we hope will make motorists stop and think before buying their next vehicle. ”
ANCAP has also produced two commercials to highlight the different crash outcomes between older and more modern vehicle choices, and raise awareness and active consideration of vehicle age as a contributing factor to road fatalities.
