Fatalities on built up roads increased by 10% over the last year and went up by 5% on minor roads across Great Britain, according to latest statistics.
Department for Transport estimates for the year ending September 2015 show there were 780 people killed in the last year on built up roads, up from 709 the year before. On minor roads there were 650 fatalities in the year, up from 620 in 2013/14.
The Government also said there were 1780 road deaths in the year, up 3% on the year before, but that the increase “is not statistically significant”.
Road safety charity Brake's campaigns director Gary Rae said: “This is yet more evidence that figures for road crashes are moving in the wrong direction. I want to know what the Government intends to do to stop these wholly preventable deaths.
"It’s time for them to take action: reintroduce casualty reduction targets, cut speed limits in both built up areas and on unpredictable rural roads, reduce the drink drive limit to 20mg per 100ml of blood and introduce much tougher penalties for criminal drivers.”
Figures also show that there were 23,700 people killed or seriously injured in the year ending September 2015, down 3% on the previous year and there were 188,830 casualties of all severities, again down 3%.
Motor traffic levels rose by 2.2% between the two years. The overall casualty rate per vehicle mile decreased by 5% over the same period.
Each road user type saw a decrease in the number of killed and seriously injured persons in the year to September 2015. The largest decrease in serious casualties was among pedal cycles (down 5% to 3340) and pedestrians (down 4% to 5300). Child KSI casualties decreased 8% to 1900 in the year.
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