Many Kiwi cars tagged as deadly in a crash
Over 40 per cent of the vehicles driven by New Zealanders are deadly, according to the NZ Transport Agency.
NZTA has compiled data showing 41 per cent of light vehicles, about 1.65 million, have 1-star and 2-star safety ratings. These are cars that do not perform well in a crash. You are twice as likely to die or be seriously injured in a crash in a 1-star or 2-star than in a 5-star vehicle.
A full two-thirds of crashes that result in deaths and serious injuries involve 1-star and 2-star vehicles.
NZTA is rolling out a new road safety advertising and education campaign to get more people into 4-star and 5-star cars.
The ‘‘Safe Vehicles Programme’’ will direct people to the rightcar.govt.nz website to check the safety rating of their car. NZTA’s senior road safety manager, Fabian Marsh, said that while everyone inevitably made mistakes while driving, the likelihood of a person surviving a serious crash was improved by better vehicles. ‘‘Checking a vehicle’s safety rating before you buy is not often high on the list of priorities ... and we would like to see that change,’’ he said. The campaign is part of the Government’s ‘‘Road to Zero’’ strategy, to reduce the road toll to zero over the next 10 years.
Meanwhile, the Government is implementing sweeping regulatory changes to improve the quality of cars entering the national fleet.
As of tomorrow, a long-flagged requirement for all vehicles entering the fleet to be fitted with electronic stability control (ESC) will finally take effect.