Global road safety campaign launched

The UK campaign to support UN Global Road Safety Week 2015 (GRSW) has been officially launched at the ROSPA conference to show support for the #SaveKidsLives campaign.

The focus for GRSW, taking place on May 4 to 10, is child road safety. Using the slogan #SaveKidsLives, theUN Road Safety Collaboration campaign is seeking to highlight the plight of children on the world’s roads, and generate action to better ensure their safety.

There will also be a drive for people and organisations around the world to sign the Child Declaration for Road Safety, developed with children from around the world.

Safies will form part of the campaign, with professionals, campaigners and members of the public around the world having their pictures taken while displaying their personal road safety messages, with the hashtag #safie.

Here in the UK, a comprehensive programme of activities and resources is being prepared by an alliance of road safety organisations, headed by Road Safety GB and including RoSPA.

The UK campaign includes a database of countrywide road safety practitioners who will link with colleagues in other countries to share expertise and experience, while a series of resources for pupils here and overseas will be made available free to download.

A series of seminars and forums will also take place during the week for practitioners across the world to interact with each other, and basic road safety information covering children as pedestrians, cyclists, public transport and travelling in cars will be distributed.

The launch took place at RoSPA’s conference, titled Stop, look and listen. Can we honestly say we do?, where the focus was pedestrian safety.

Kevin Clinton, RoSPA’s head of road safety, said, ‘Pedestrian safety is most associated with educating children, but with a public health emphasis on increasing walking, coupled with the distraction of technology and increasingly busy lives, helping adults is also an area that needs much thought. It’s important that we don’t lose sight of the needs of pedestrians.

‘This is just one of the reasons why RoSPA is proud to be involved in UK GRSW. We want to protect children and adults around the world from the dangers of the road.’

Honor Byford, chairman of the UK GRSW National Organising Committee and of Road Safety GB, told delegates at the conference that the week is a milestone event on the global road safety calendar, which gives added impetus to the UN Decade of Action for Road Safety (2011-2020) and its goal of saving five million lives.

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