IP/10/970

Brussels, 20 July 2010

Road Safety: Commission outlines measures to halve road deaths by 2020

The European Commission has today adopted challenging plans to reduce the number of road deaths on Europe's roads by half in the next 10 years. Initiatives proposed today in a set of European Road Safety Policy Orientations 2011-2020 range from setting higher standards for vehicle safety, to improving the training of road users, and increasing the enforcement of road rules. The Commission will work closely with Member States to implement this programme.

European Commission Vice-President Siim Kallas responsible for Transport, said: "A hundred people die everyday on Europe's roads. We have made good progress since 2001 and we have succeeded in saving nearly 80,000 lives. But the number of fatalities and injuries on our roads is still unacceptable. We are looking at what kind of cars motorists drive, where they drive and how they drive and we want to cut road deaths in half by 2020."

Road safety action programme 2011-2020:

The Commission has today set out a mix of initiatives focussing on making improvements to vehicles, infrastructure and road users' behaviour.

There are seven strategic objectives:

• Improved safety measures for trucks and cars

• Building safer roads

• Developing intelligent vehicles

• Strengthening licensing and training

• Better enforcement

• Targeting injuries

• A new focus on motorcyclists.

Detailed measures for each strategic objective are listed in attached MEMO/10/343.

Attached table "Road Fatalities per Country" shows progress under 2001-2010 Road Safety Action Plan, with EU-wide figures and country breakdown.

More information:

http://ec.europa.eu/transport/road_safety/events-archive/2010_07_20_road_safety_2011_2020_en.htm

Road fatalities by country (per million inhabitants)

NB. The decrease in road fatalities is expected to pass 40% in 2010 (from 36% in 2009).