Statistical Release 30 July 2020

Reported road casualties in

Great Britain: provisional results 2019

There were 1,748 reported road deaths in 2019, similar to the level seen since
2012, which follows a period of substantial reduction in fatalities from 2006 to
2010.

About this release Chart 1: Fatalities in reported road accidents: GB, 2004-2019
This release gives an overview and
commentary of reported road casualties
in 2019. It provides the number of
personal injury road traffic accidents 3,221
in Great Britain that were reported by 1,748
2%
the police in 2019 using the STATS19 change
since
reporting system. It also includes the 2018
number of people killed or injured in
these accidents and which road user 1,754
group they were in.

This is the first release of provisional

headline accident and casualty figures
for 2019, which will be followed by the ‘04 ‘12 '18 '19
final publication in September (Reported
Road Casualties Great Britain 2019).
More details on why these figures are • There were 25,975 serious injuries in road traffic accidents
provisional are given on page 2. reported to the police in 2019. However, comparison
of this figure with earlier years should be interpreted with
caution due to changes in systems for severity reporting by
some police forces. The report contains further information
In this publication and an estimate adjusted to account for this discontinuity.
Introduction ...................................p2

Headline statistics .........................p3

• There was a total of 153,315 casualties of all severities
Summary of trends ........................p7 in reported road traffic accidents in 2019. This is 5% lower
Trends in casualty rates ................p8 than in 2018 and is the lowest level since 1979 when this
Casualties by road user type ........p9 statistical series with current definitions and detail began.
Strengths and weaknesses ..........p20

Data tables ...................................p43 • Accounting for change in traffic, the rate of fatalities per
Background information ...............p44
billion vehicle miles has fallen by 2% from 5.38 in 2018 to
5.25 fatalities per billion vehicle miles in 2019.
RESPONSIBLE STATISTICIAN: Aimee Murphy Email: roadacc.stats@dft.gov.uk
FURTHER INFORMATION: Media: 020 7944 6898 Public: 020 7944 6595
 Introduction

This publication provides the number of personal injury Further information

road traffic accidents in Great Britain that were reported to
the police in 2019 using the STATS19 reporting system. It Information about the data collected,
notes, definitions and guidance is available
also includes the number of people killed or injured in these
here: https://www.gov.uk/government/
accidents and which road user group they were in. publications/road-accidents-and-safety-
statistics-guidance.
The figures make up part of a long running series going back
to 1926. The current set of definitions and detail of information
goes back to 1979, providing a long period for comparison.

The information used to create these statistics are collected by police forces, either through officers
attending the scene of accidents or from members of the public reporting the accident in police
stations after the incident, or more recently online.

There is no obligation for people to report all personal injury accidents to the police
(although there is an obligation under certain conditions, as outlined in the Road Traffic Act). These
figures, therefore, do not represent the full range of all accidents or casualties in Great Britain.
Please see the section on strengths and weaknesses of the data for further details.

All accidents that were reported by the police and that occurred on a public highway involving at
least one motor vehicle, horse rider or pedal cyclist, and where at least one person was injured
are included. Accidents that happened on private land (including private drives) or car parks are
not included in the statistics. Damage only accidents that do not result in personal injury are also
excluded from these statistics.

Provisional estimates

Figures in this release are provisional and will be revised in the annual report in September after
further validation, although this is not expected to have any impact on the trends and changes
identified. Most of this validation is focused on accident coordinates and therefore some of
the geographical results presented here might slightly change. The validation will also impact
parameters used in the adjustment model for severity and therefore estimates for serious
injuries, and to a lesser extent, slight injuries, might marginally change.

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 2

 Headline statistics
Fatalities

A total of 1,748 people were killed in reported road traffic accidents in Great Britain in 2019, similar
to the level seen since 2012, which followed a period of substantial reduction in fatalities from 2006
to 2010.
Definition
Chart 2: Fatalities in reported road accidents: GB, 1979-2019
Casualty: A person killed
7,000 or injured in a reported
6,352 accident on a public
6,000 road. Casualties are
sub-divided into killed,
5,000 seriously injured and
slightly injured.
4,000

A full list of the definitions

3,000 used in this release can
be found here: https://
1,748
2,000 www.gov.uk/government/
21%
since publications/road-
1,000 2009 accidents-and-safety-
statistics-guidance.
0
1979 1985 1991 1997 2003 2009 2015

The trend in the number of fatalities has been broadly flat since 2010. Previously, and particularly
between 2006 and 2010, the general trend was for fatalities to fall. Since that point, most of the
year on year changes are either explained by one-off causes (for instance, the snow in 2010) or
natural variation. The evidence points towards Britain being in a period when the fatality numbers
are stable and most of the changes relate to random variation. The number of fatalities in 2019
(1,748) was 2% less than in 2018 (1,784), however, this small decrease may be due to natural
variation.

Serious injuries

In 2019, there were 25,975 seriously injured casualties in reported road traffic accidents. This
figure is as reported to the police and is not comparable to earlier years due to changes in
severity reporting. From 2016 onwards, figures on the severity of injury have been affected by a
large number of police forces changing their reporting systems. It is likely that the recording of
injury severity is more accurate for forces using these new reporting systems. This has had a large
impact on the number of serious injuries recorded in 2016 (24,101), 2017 (24,831), 2018 (25,511)
and 2019 (25,975) compared with 2015 (22,144). Some of these serious injuries may previously
have been classified as slight injuries which means that the 2016, 2017, 2018 and 2019 serious
injury figures are not comparable to previous years and to each other. Please see the strengths

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 3

and weaknesses section for more information.

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) Methodology Advisory Service have completed analysis to
quantify the effect of the introduction of new injury based reporting systems (CRASH and COPA)
on the number of slight and serious injuries reported to the police, and to estimate the level of
slight and serious injuries as if all police forces were using injury-based reporting systems. This is
described in detail in the final ONS methodology report. The final report was published alongside
last year’s Road Casualties in Great Britain 2018 statistical release to set out how this methodology
was finalised: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/reported-road-casualties-in-great-britain-
annual-report-2018.
Changes in systems
This methodology has allowed us to produce the following for severity reporting
experimental statistics. This is a developing area, where we continue Please see the changes in
to welcome users views both on the methodology and on the ways reporting systems section within
in which you are using the statistics and any challenges you face. the Strengths and Weaknesses
chapter for more information on
Last year we implemented the severity adjustments methodology
the changes in systems for severity
for the first time and published adjusted figures in a limited number reporting.
of our statistical tables. This year we have included adjusted
The Office for National Statistics
figures in all of the statistical tables that are published alongside have completed work to quantify
the provisional results 2019 release. We will continue to roll out the the effect of the introduction of
severity adjustments to more of our statistical tables in Reported these systems on the number
of slight and serious injuries. An
road casualties in Great Britain, annual report: 2019 and welcome
update to the final methodology is
feedback from users. However, in advance of that and to aid user available in the Annex.
understanding, we included the probabilities of each casualty being
A selection of tables which
serious under injury-based systems alongside the underlying dataset accompany the publication present
https://data.gov.uk/dataset/cb7ae6f0-4be6-4935-9277-47e5ce24a11f/ both the numbers of serious and
slight injuries as reported by
road-safety-data. This is so that users can reproduce the summary
the police, and adjusted for the
tables and test out some limited further splits. Further guidance is change in reporting systems
given in the Annex. side by side for comparison.

We welcome your feedback

The model has been updated in 2020 for use in producing 2019 on this approach, specifically
adjustments, as more police forces moved to an injury based how you are using these
statistics and whether this
reporting system in 2019.
meets your needs. Please
contact us at roadacc.stats@
As a guide to users, we recommend using the adjusted serious dft.gov.uk.
injuries data for understanding trends over time. However, for
users wishing to look at low level geographic data just for the latest
year, you are advised to use the unadjusted data. This is whilst we
complete the verification work in the coming year on the use of this
modelled approach to small subsets of the data. Further guidance on
how to use the adjustments is given in the Annex.

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 4

Assuming that all police forces were using injury-based severity reporting systems, the analysis
estimates that there were 27,840 serious injuries and 29,588 people killed or seriously injured in
2019.

Chart 3: Serious injuries in reported road accidents (adjusted and reported): GB, 2004-2019
50,000

45,000

40,000

35,000 Adjusted
serious injuries
30,000
Police reported
Historical years are serious injuries
25,000 adjusted assuming that
all police forces were
20,000 using injury-based
reporting systems. The CRASH adopted by around half
gap between the of police forces in England end
15,000 adjusted and reported 2015/early 2016; COPA goes
lines narrows as injury- live to officers in Nov 2016
based reporting systems First full year of
10,000 (CRASH and COPA) are COPA being in place
adopted.
5,000 CRASH adopted during 2019 by
all the Scottish police forces,
Sussex and Lancashire
0
2004 2006 2008 2010 2012 2014 2016 2018

Chart 3 shows that when accounting for changes in reporting, the estimated number of serious
injuries since 2010 has declined slightly, at a slower rate than before 2010.

Slight injuries

In 2019, there were 125,592 slightly injured casualties in reported road traffic accidents reported to
the police. As explained in the previous section, this figure is as reported to the police.

Applying the severity adjustments methodology developed with the Office for National Statistics
results in an estimated 123,727 slightly injured casualties, assuming that all police forces were
using an injury-based severity reporting system.

Chart 4: Slight injuries in reported road accidents (adjusted and reported): GB, 2004-2019
300,000

250,000

200,000 Police reported

slight injuries

150,000
Adjusted slight
injuries
100,000

50,000

0
2004 2006 2008 2010 2012 2014 2016 2018

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 5

Chart 4 shows that when accounting for changes in reporting, the number of slight injuries in 2016
to 2019 has continued the decreasing trend observed since 2014.

Total casualties

There was a total of 153,315 casualties of all severities in reported road traffic accidents in 2019.
This is 5% lower than in 2018 and is the lowest level since 1979 when this statistical series with
current definitions and detail began. However, this figure should be interpreted with caution for two
reasons:

• It has long been known that non-fatal (and particularly slight) casualties are underreported to
the police and therefore this figure is likely to be an underestimate of the total.

• The introduction of online self-reporting by the Metropolitan Police Service at the end of 2016
and a few other forces in 2018 (see online self-reporting section on page 34 for more details),
may have affected the number of non-fatal (and particularly slight) casualties reported in these
forces and therefore impact the total for Great Britain.

Comparisons to trends in other data sources available seem to suggest little change or a slight
fall in casualties would be expected between 2018 and 2019. Please see the strengths and
weaknesses section for further information page 24.

Chart 5: Casualties in reported road accidents: GB, 1979-2019

400,000
334,513
350,000

300,000

222,146
250,000

200,000 153,315
31%
150,000 since
2009
100,000

50,000

0
1979 1985 1991 1997 2003 2009 2015

The long term trend in the number of casualties in reported road accidents was broadly flat from
1979 to 1998, allowing for natural variation in the number of casualties. Since 1998 there has been
a downward trend in the number of casualties.

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 6

 Summary of trends

The summary table below shows the number of reported road casualties in Great Britain in 2019
compared with previous years. Changes in unadjusted figures are presented for wider context, but
it is advised to use the adjusted figures and changes to assess trends over recent years.

Percentage change from:

2019 2018 2009

Killed 1,748 ↓ 2% ↓ 21%
Seriously injured (unadjusted)1 25,975 ↑ 2% ↑ 5%
Seriously injured (adjusted)2 27,840 ↓ 1% ↓ 17%
KSI (unadjusted)1,3 27,723 ↑ 2% ↑ 3%
KSI (adjusted)2,3 29,588 ↓ 1% ↓ 17%
Slightly injured (unadjusted)1 125,592 ↓ 6% ↓ 36%
Slightly injured (adjusted)2 123,727 ↓ 5% ↓ 34%
↓ 5% ↓ 31%
All casualties 153,315

1. As reported to the police.

2. Adjusted estimates following methodology from the Office for National Statistics Methodology Advisory Service
analysis accounting for change in severity reporting.
3. KSI - Killed or Seriously injured.

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 7

 Trends in casualty rates
There are two key ways of looking at casualty numbers, in terms of absolute counts or in terms
of rates taking into account distance travelled. The following graphs show trends in casualties per
billion vehicle miles by severity.

Killed or seriously injured per

Fatalities per billion vehicle miles billion vehicle miles

150
12 88.8 KSI
(adjusted) rate
per billion
KSI (adjusted) rate
vehicle miles
2% change
5.2 fatality rate since 2018

6 per billion 75
vehicle miles KSI (unadjusted) rate 83.2 KSI
2% change (unadjusted)
since 2018 rate per
billion
vehicle miles

0 0
2004 2011 2019 2004 2011 2019

Total casualties per billion vehicle miles Traffic

(billion vehicle miles) *
1,000

460.4 casualty rate 0.5% 8.8%

per billion vehicle change change
miles
since 2018 since 2010
5% change
500 since 2018

* Provisional road traffic estimates, Great Britain: April 2019

to March 2020: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/
provisional-road-traffic-estimates-great-britain-april-2019-to-
0 march-2020. Traffic figures here exclude pedestrians and for
2004 2011 2019 2019 include 2018 pedal cyclists traffic as a proxy for 2019
traffic. This is likely to be an underestimate as pedal cycle
traffic has been increasing slightly in recent years.

The number of fatalities per billion vehicle miles travelled has fallen slightly from 2009 (7.1) to
5.2 fatalities per billion miles travelled in 2019. When looking at the adjusted series, we see the
number of killed or seriously injured casualties per billion vehicle miles decreased sharply until
2010, and declined gradually since to 88.8 people killed or seriously injured per billion vehicle
miles travelled in 2019. This is because killed or seriously injured casualty numbers have declined
slightly since 2010 while traffic has increased over the same period. The casualty rate per billion
vehicle miles travelled decreased between 2009 to 2019 from 714.2 to 460.4 casualties per billion
vehicle miles travelled, a decrease of 36%.

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 8

 Casualties by road user type
In terms of absolute counts, car occupants (including car drivers and car passengers) come out
as the road user group with the greatest number of casualties and fatalities each year (43% of total
fatalities and 58% of total casualties in 2019). However, this is unsurprising as cars account for
around 80% of the traffic on British roads.

Fatalities by road user type

In 2019, car occupants accounted for 43% of road deaths, pedestrians 26%, motorcyclists 19%
and pedal cyclists 6%.

Fatalities in Proportion % change

2019 in 2019 since 2018

743 43% 4%

462 26% 1%

335 19% 5%

98 6% 1%

Other 110 6% 12%*

*Change should be interpreted with caution, given the underlying numbers for ‘other’ vehicles are smaller than other road user

types.

In terms of casualty rates (casualties per mile travelled) for each mode of transport, road
users are split into two clearly distinctive groups. The first, with much higher casualty rates, are
typically referred to as vulnerable road users (usually defined as pedestrians, pedal cyclists
and motorcyclists). All of these groups have much higher casualty rates per mile travelled in
comparison with the other road user groups, as shown in Chart 6.

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 9

Chart 6: Casualty rate per billion passenger miles by road user type: GB, 2019

Vulnerable road user groups

6,000 Useful links

5,475
5,068 Figures for billion
Casualty rate per billion passenger miles

5,000
passenger miles by mode
of travel are derived from
4,000 the following sources:

3,000 National Travel Survey,

2018: https://www.
gov.uk/government/
2,000
1,613 statistics/national-travel-
survey-2018
1,000
Annual bus statistics:
211 141 50 37 year ending March 2019:
0
1 1 1 1 https://www.gov.uk/
government/statistics/
annual-bus-statistics-
year-ending-march-2019
Chart 7: Fatality rate per billion passenger miles by road user type:
GB, 2019 Provisional road traffic
Vulnerable road user groups estimates, Great Britain:
April 2019 to March
120 2020: https://www.gov.
113.3
uk/government/statistics/
provisional-road-traffic-
Fatality rate per billion passenger miles

100
estimates-great-britain-
april-2019-to-march-2020.
80

60 1. Pedestrian miles

walked, pedal cyclist

40 34.1 traffic, motorcyclist traffic
29.4
and bus passenger miles
20
are based on 2018 figures

1.8 0.6 0.6 0.9 as no 2019 figures are

0
1 1 1 1 available at the time of

publication.

The pattern for pedal cycles is notable: the overall casualty rate of 5,068 casualties per billion
miles cycled is close to the motorcycling casualty rate, whereas the fatality rate of 29.4 per billion
miles cycled is much closer to the pedestrian rate. Over time there has been a decrease in the risk
of all modes, however, vulnerable road users are still the most at risk.

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 10

Car occupants
Car occupants continue to account for the largest proportion of casualties of all severities.
A total of 743 car occupants were killed in 2019, down 4% (or 34 fatalities) from 777 in 2018.
As cars account for the most traffic on Great Britain roads (around 80%) the car occupant fatality
rate per billion passenger miles travelled was 1.8 in 2019. The majority of car occupant fatalities
were of car drivers, with 516 car drivers killed and 227 car passengers killed in 2019. Car
occupants represents 43% of all fatalities in reported road accidents in 2019. Overall car occupant
casualties decreased by 5% to 89,382 in 2019 compared to 2018, and was the lowest on record
representing 58% of all casualties in reported road accidents in 2019.

Fatalities Killed or seriously injured

16,000
1,200 11,539
2% change
KSI (adjusted)
743 since 2018
4% change
since 2018 10,751
600 8,000 KSI (unadjusted)

0 0
2009 2014 2019 2009 2014 2019

Total casualties Traffic

(billion vehicle miles)

150,000 260
257 billion
vehicle miles
89,382 1% change
5% change since 2018
since 2018
75,000 130

0 0
2009 2014 2019 2009 2014 2019

Car and taxi traffic in Great Britain increased by 1% from 2018 to 2019. Although increases in car
and taxi traffic can lead to an increase in accidents, other factors can have a stronger influence on
road safety.

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 11

Pedestrians
Although Pedestrian fatalities increased slightly from 456 in 2018 to 462 in 2019, the number
of fatalities has remained broadly constant over the last ten years and year-on-year changes are
likely to be due to natural variation. Overall, pedestrian casualties decreased by 3% between 2018
and 2019 to 21,836 pedestrian casualties. Pedestrians represented 14% of all casualties in 2019,
increasing very slightly in each of the last five years.

Fatalities Killed or seriously injured

8,000 6,700
500 KSI (adjusted) 2% change
since 2018
462
1% change 6,299
since 2018 KSI (unadjusted)

250 4,000

0
2009 2014 2019 0
2009 2014 2019

Total casualties Distance walked

(billion miles) *

30,000 14
21,836 14 billion miles
3% change 2% change
since 2018 since 2017

15,000 7

0 0
2009 2014 2019 2008 2013 2018

Estimates of distance walked have increased since 2014. However, the 2019 estimate is not yet
available.*

* Distance walked in Great Britain up to 2018 is estimated by using National Travel Survey average distance travelled in England

for each year multiplied by Great Britain population for that year. Figures for 2019 are not yet available and will be updated in the

September annual report.

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 12

Pedal cyclists
Although the number of pedal cyclists killed on the roads in 2019 was slightly lower than in 2018,
the 98 fatalities is very similar to the level seen since 2009. Any changes since that point are most
likely to be as a result of natural variation and cannot be attributed to underlying causes.

Fatalities Killed or seriously injured

120 98 5,000 4,092

KSI (adjusted) 3% change
1% change
since 2018 since 2018

3,792
KSI (unadjusted)

60 2,500

0 0
2009 2014 2019 2009 2014 2019

Total casualties Traffic

(billion vehicle miles) *

4 3 billion
22,000 vehicle miles
16,873 2% change
since 2017
4% change
since 2018

11,000 2

0 0
2009 2014 2019 2008 2013 2018

The number of pedal cyclists killed or seriously injured in Great Britain has increased by 11%
between 2009 (3,689) to 2019 (4,092) (using the series adjusted for changes in severity
reporting). This is partly explained by an increase in pedal cyclist traffic* in Great Britain of 17%
from 2008 to 2018 (2.8 to 3.3 billion vehicle miles). Overall pedal cyclist casualties decreased by
4% between 2018 and 2019.

* Pedal cycle traffic figures for 2019 are not yet available and will be updated in the September annual report.

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 13

Motorcyclists
Motorcyclist fatalities decreased in 2019 compared to 2018. In total, 335 motorcyclists were killed
during 2019, down 5% from 354 in 2018. However, motorcyclist fatalities have fluctuated between
319 and 365 over 2011 to 2019 with no clear trend. Overall motorcyclist casualties decreased by
4% between 2018 and 2019 to 16,196 casualties. Motorcyclist traffic has been stable in the last ten
years*.

Fatalities Killed or seriously injured

500 8,000
KSI (adjusted)
5,892
6% change
335 since 2018
5% change
since 2018
KSI (unadjusted) 5,599
250 4,000

0
0
2009 2014 2019
2009 2014 2019

Total casualties Traffic

(billion vehicle miles) *

4
22,000
16,196 3 billion
vehicle miles
4% change 1% change
since 2018 since 2017

11,000 2

0 0
2009 2014 2019 2008 2013 2018

* Motorcyclist traffic figures for 2019 are not yet available and will be updated in the September annual report.

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 14

Bus and coach occupants
In 2019, there were 13 bus and coach occupant fatalities, of which 11 were bus or coach
passengers and 2 were bus or coach drivers. Bus and coach occupant fatalities have fluctuated
between 5 and 14 in the last ten years with no clear trend.

Overall bus and coach casualties have shown a decreasing trend, decreasing by more than a
half from 2009 (6,317) to 2019 (3,090). The number of bus and coach occupant casualties have
decreased in the last year by 19% from 3,801 in 2018 to 3,090 in 2019, of which in the latest year
91% were passengers. Out of all bus and coach occupant passenger casualties in 2019, 36% were
older people (aged 60 and over).

Bus and coach traffic has also shown a decreasing trend in the last ten years. In 2018, bus and
coach traffic was 2.3 billion vehicle miles, a decrease of 5% compared to 2017*.

Fatalities Killed or seriously injured

20 600

KSI (adjusted) 326

16% change
13 since 2018
10 63% change 300
since 2018 KSI (unadjusted) 307

0 0
2009 2014 2019 2009 2014 2019

Total casualties Traffic

(billion vehicle miles) *

7,000 4

3,090
3,500 19% change 2 2 billion
since 2018 vehicle miles
5% change
since 2017

0 0
2009 2014 2019 2008 2013 2018

* Bus and coach traffic figures for 2019 are not yet available and will be updated in the September annual report.

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 15

Goods vehicle occupants
In 2019, there were 67 goods vehicle occupant (including heavy and light goods vehicle)
fatalities, of which 56 were goods vehicle drivers and 11 were goods vehicle passengers. Goods
vehicle fatalities have fluctuated between 47 and 67 in the last ten years.

Overall goods vehicle casualties have shown a decreasing trend, decreasing by 3% from 5,071
in 2018 to 4,938 in 2019, of which in the latest year 80% were goods vehicle occupant driver
casualties.

Goods vehicle occupant traffic has shown an increasing trend from 2013 to 2017 and has remained
stable since. In 2019, goods vehicle traffic was 68 billion vehicle miles, a slight decrease of 0.2%
compared to 2018.

Fatalities Killed or seriously injured

70 1,000 779
3% change
67 KSI (adjusted) since 2018
22% change
since 2018
728
KSI (unadjusted)
35 500

0 0
2009 2014 2019 2009 2014 2019

Total casualties Traffic

(billion vehicle miles)

7,000 70
68 billion
vehicle miles
0.2% change
since 2018
4,938
3,500 3% change 35
since 2018

0 0
2009 2014 2019 2009 2014 2019

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 16

Children (aged 15 or under)
There were 39 child deaths in 2019, a decrease from 48 in 2018. Child fatalities have fluctuated
between 39 and 69 during 2010 to 2019 with no clear trend. Overall child casualties decreased by
5% between 2018 and 2019 to 13,584 casualties in 2019 which is the lowest year on record.

As has been the case historically, child fatalities are mainly pedestrian (18 fatalities in 2019),
pedal cyclists (10 fatalities in 2019) and car passenger (8 fatalities in 2019). These are the forms
of transport most commonly used by children.

Fatalities Killed or seriously injured

4,000
90
KSI (adjusted) 2,455
1% change
since 2018
39
19% change 2,000
45 since 2018
KSI (unadjusted) 2,259

0 0
2009 2014 2019 2009 2014 2019

Total casualties Population

(millions)

22,000

11,000 13,584
5% change
since 2018

0
2009 2014 2019

The population of different age

These trends are observed despite the population of children
groups in Great Britain is from
aged 0-15 in Great Britain increasing by 8% since 2009.
the Office of National Statistics

population figures: https://

www.nomisweb.co.uk/query/

select/getdatasetbytheme.

asp?opt=3&theme=&subgrp

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 17

Young casualties (aged 17 to 24)
The number of fatalities aged 17 to 24 in reported road traffic accidents has decreased, with 244
fatalities in 2019 compared with 279 fatalities in 2018. This follows from a general year-on-year
downward trend. There were 27,004 young casualties of all severities, down 6% from 2018.

There were fewer young fatalities who were car drivers in 2019 (99 fatalities in 2018 and 88
fatalities in 2019) and as car passengers (67 fatalities in 2018 and 54 fatalities in 2019). There
were no young pedal cyclist fatalities in 2019 compared with 7 in 2018. There were also fewer
young fatalities as pedestrians in 2019 (47 fatalities in 2018 and 38 fatalities in 2019).

The population of young people in Great Britain followed a steady upward trend until 2011. Since
2011 the population of young people in Great Britain gradually fell to 6.2 million people in 2019. The
population in this age group has decreased by 1% in 2019 compared with 2018. This decreasing
trend may partly explain the downwards trend in fatalities and KSIs seen for this age group.

Fatalities Killed or seriously injured

600 9,000

KSI (adjusted) 5,202

2% change
since 2018
300
4,500
244
13% change
KSI (unadjusted) 4,865
since 2018

0
0
2009 2014 2019
2009 2014 2019

Total casualties Population

60,000
7M

6.2M
1% change
27,004 since 2018
30,000 6% change
4M
since 2018

0 M
2009 2014 2019 2009 2014 2019

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 18

Older casualties (aged 60 and over)
The number of fatalities aged 60 and over in reported road accidents has increased by 8% from
588 in 2018 to 637 in 2019. This increase in fatalities may partly be due to more older fatalities
as car drivers with 207 in 2019 compared to 180 in 2018, and car passengers with 98 in 2019
compared to 79 in 2018.

The number of killed or seriously injured casualties aged 60 and over in reported road accidents
(using the adjusted severity series) has decreased by 2% from 6,003 in 2018 to 5,884 in 2019.

The population in this age group has increased by 2% compared with 2018 and by 17% compared
with 2009. This relatively rapidly growing population may partly explain the upturn in fatalities seen
for this age group in the last few years.

There were 21,391 older casualties of all severities in 2019, a decrease of 5% compared to 2018
(22,483).

Fatalities Killed or seriously injured

5,884
700 6,000
KSI (adjusted) 2% change
since 2018

637
8% change
since 2018
KSI (unadjusted) 5,534

350 3,000

0 0
2009 2014 2019
2009 2014 2019

Total casualties Population

25,000

21,391
5% change
since 2018
12,500

0
2009 2014 2019

The increase in fatalities is seen for all detailed older age groups (60 to 69, 70 to 79, 80 and more)
since 2010. Part of this increase is likely due to an increase in the population for these age groups
over the same time period.

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 19

 Strengths and weaknesses of the data
Underreporting of casualties and accidents and other sources of
information
Comparisons of road accident reports with death registrations show that very few, if any, road
accident fatalities are not reported by the police. However, it has long been known that a
considerable proportion of non-fatal casualties are not known to the police, as hospital, survey and
compensation claims data all indicate a higher number of casualties than those recorded in police
accident data.

Each of these other sources provide a means to assess the coherence of the police reported data
in terms of absolute numbers of casualties and also trends in casualties.

We have considered 5 alternative sources here. Each one is described in more detail below, and
how they can be used in conjunction with the Stats19 data.

• The National Travel Survey (https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/national-travel-

survey-statistics): this includes questions asked since 2007 on whether respondents resident
in England (both adults and children) have been involved in road accidents on public roads
(including pavements and cycle lanes on public roads) in Great Britain; whether they sustained
injuries, what type, and whether the police attended or they reported later. This provides a self-
reported estimate, with a range of definitional differences of injuries and questions of recall bias
that will mean the results will differ from those obtained through the Stats19 data collection.
Given the NTS data in theory captures all road injury accidents people had, this gives a way of
estimating the total number of road accidents, including those not recorded through Stats19.

• Hospital Episodes Statistics (https://digital.nhs.uk/data-and-information/data-tools-and-

services/data-services/hospital-episode-statistics): this administrative data comes from hospital
systems which records for people who were admitted whether they were recorded as involved
in a road traffic accident and provides a diagnosis code that can then be matched to the
seriousness of the injury. The Department has carried out analysis to better understand how
well this data maps to STATS19 police recorded road casualties that were clinically seriously
injured. It determined that the injury-based approach, used in CRASH, has the possibility to
produce something more objective and closer to medical definitions than the severity based
approach.

• Compensation recovery unit data (https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/cru): this

administrative data comes from the DWP Compensation recovery unit who work with insurance
companies, solicitors and Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) customers, to recover
social security benefits paid as a result of an accident, injury or disease, if a compensation
payment has been made (the Compensation Recovery Scheme) and costs incurred by NHS
hospitals and Ambulance Trusts for treatment from injuries from road traffic accidents and
Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 20
 personal injury claims (Recovery of NHS Charges)

• Motor Insurance Claims statistics (https://www.abi.org.uk/data-and-resources/industry-data/

free-industry-data-downloads/): the Association of British Insurers collects data from insurers on
the type and number of claims made.

• Road Traffic statistics (https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/road-traffic-estimates-in-

great-britain-2018): this is DfT data collected from around 8,000 roadside 12-hour manual
counts, continuous data from around 300 automatic traffic counters, and data on road lengths.
This provides estimates of vehicle miles travelled.

National Travel Survey

Data for 2019 is not yet available but this section provides longer term trends up to 2018, based on
self-reported responses to the road accident questions.

The chart below, based on published table RAS54004 (https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/

system/uploads/attachment data/file/665317/ras54004.ods), shows annual estimates of non-
fatal road casualties from the NTS, with approximate confidence limits, for 5 year averages from
2009 to 2018. This shows that since 2010-2014, the estimated number of injury accidents has
been decreasing. The absolute number of injury collisions estimated from this source was around
560,000 in 2014-2018.

Chart 8: Estimates of the annual non-fatal road casualties using National Travel Survey data:
Great Britain

Of people reporting a personal road accident injury in the three years before their NTS interview,
the most common injury reported has been whiplash. For the average of three years of data
from 2016 to 2018, 49% of respondents having a road injury accident reported a whiplash injury.
Note this relates to injuries received in the most recent road accident the respondent reported in
Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 21
the three years before their interview, and respondents can record more than one injury for this
accident. In 2009-2011, this proportion was 59% and in recent years there has been a decreasing
trend in the proportion of respondents reporting whiplash injuries.
However, this is offset by increases in those reporting ‘minor bruising or minor cuts’ which were
reported by 44% of all respondents reporting a road accident in the data in 2016-2018.

Chart 9: Proportion of respondents reporting whiplash or “minor bruising or minor cuts” in

personal injury road accidents: NTS, England, 3-year averages

65
Whiplash
60
Minor bruising or minor cuts
55

50

45

40

35

30
2007-2009 2009-2011 2011-2013 2013-2015 2015-2017

The proportion of respondents that reported more serious injuries such as fractures, severe shock
or internal injuries had been around 36% for most 3-year data periods since 2007. However, NTS
self-reported serious injuries did increase from 33% to 44% between 2013-2015 and 2016-2018.
This may link to the increased proportion who reported attending hospital in recent periods.

Over time the proportion of road accident injuries where the respondent reported attending hospital
(either A&E or as an inpatient) was generally decreasing over time from 47% in 2008-2010 to 36%
in 2014-2016. However, in the last two periods, it has increased to 43%.

Chart 10: Proportion of respondents reporting medical attention in personal injury accidents
as A&E or as a hospital inpatient: NTS, England, 3 year averages
60

55

50

45

40

35

30

25

20
2007-2009 2009-2011 2011-2013 2013-2015 2015-2017

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 22

Lastly, the respondent indicates whether the police attended at the scene, or whether they later
informed the police. The average of data for 2016-2018 shows that 49% of most recently self-
reported road accident injuries occurring in the three years before the NTS interview were not
reported to the police.

Chart 11: Proportion of respondents not reporting road accident injuries to the police: NTS,
England, 3 year averages
60

55

50

45

40

35

30

25

20
2007-2009 2009-2011 2011-2013 2013-2015 2015-2017

What is not clear from this self-reported data is how many of these would not have qualified as
injuries had the police attended the scene of the road accident. Overall, the NTS supports the
downwards trend in the overall number of injuries in recent years to 2018.

Hospital Episodes Statistics

Analysis of the Hospital Episode Statistics from NHS Digital allows us to report on the number of
admitted patient care admissions where the admission is recorded as being related to a road traffic
accident. This source also records diagnosis codes which we can match to determine whether
these admissions have a clinically defined serious injury. This definition is based on the maximum
score on the abbreviated injury scale: an injury is considered clinically serious with a score of three
or higher (MAIS3+).

Chart 12 shows the time series of the number of admissions for road traffic accidents broken
down by MAIS score. This shows that the total number of admissions for road traffic accidents has
fluctuated around 35,000 non-fatal admissions to hospital for road traffic accidents.

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 23

Chart 12: Estimated number of admissions for road traffic
What is MAIS3+?
accidents by MAIS score, England, 1999-2016

40,000 The Abbreviated Injury Scale (AIS)

severity score is an ordinal scale
35,000
of 1 to 6 (1 indicating a minor
injury and 6 being maximal). Each
30,000
patient’s diagnosis code is matched
25,000 to an AIS score using a lookup. A
casualty that sustains an injury with
20,000 a score of 3 or higher on the AIS
is classified as clinically seriously
15,000
injured (MAIS3+).
10,000

Update to HES
5,000
analysis
0
1999 2001 2003 2005 2007 2009 2011 2013 2015
MAIS 1-2 MAIS3+ no match or unknown The 2015 annual report included
an article discussing the first
estimates for the total number
Out of all admissions for road traffic accidents, the proportion with of people admitted to hospital in
a MAIS score of 1 or 2 (less serious injuries) has remained stable England, Great Britain and the
United Kingdom with a clinically
over this period at around 70%. The proportion with a MAIS score
defined serious injury following a
of 3 or more was stable from 1999 to 2010 at around 11% but from road traffic accident, with Hospital
2011 increased every year to reach 16% in 2016. Conversely, Episodes Statistics (HES) data
the proportion of admissions with an unknown MAIS score or for the years 1999 to 2011. This
analysis was extended to include
where the MAIS score could not be matched has decreased in the
data from 2012 to 2016 in the 2017
same period. It is likely that changes in recording have resulted report.
in more records to be matched to MAIS3+, rather than a genuine
Estimates for England were
increase in clinically serious injuries. Further analysis is needed to extrapolated to Great Britain using
understand this change. Stats19 data. Actual MAIS3+
figures for Nothern Ireland were
Chart 13: Proportion of admissions for road traffic accidents added to calculate the estimate for
the United Kingdom.
by MAIS score, England, 1999-2016
80% The MAIS3+ figures for 1999
MAIS 1-2 to 2016 can be found in table
70%
RAS55050 https://www.gov.uk/
% of non-fatal admissions for road traffic accidents

60%
government/uploads/system/
uploads/attachment_data/
50% file/555730/ras55050.ods.

40% More detail about the source of

the data and the abbreviated injury
30%
scale can be found in the original

20% no match or unknown article from the 2015 report at:

https://www.gov.uk/government/
10% MAIS3+ statistics/reported-road-casualties-
great-britain-annual-report-2015
0%
1999 2001 2003 2005 2007 2009 2011 2013 2015

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 24

On the most serious end of the scale, trends in MAIS3+ admissions can be compared to Stats19
serious injuries. The stability of MAIS3+ estimates described above does not appear to be
consistent with the trend observed in serious injuries as reported by the police over the same
period. The number of serious injuries reported to the police has steadily decreased from 1999 to
2010, and has been relatively stable from 2010 to 2016.

Chart 14: Comparison of serious casualties reported by police and estimated number of
MAIS3+ casualties, England, 1999-2016
40,000

35,000

30,000

25,000
Stats19 serious
20,000

15,000

10,000
MAIS3+
5,000

0
1999 2001 2003 2005 2007 2009 2011 2013 2015

Note that the estimated number of MAIS3+ casualties has always been lower than the number of
serious injuries reported in police data. This is likely to be due to MAIS3+ capturing more severe
injuries than the definition of serious injury in police reported data. By definition MAIS3+ includes
very severe injuries such as traumatic brain injuries whereas the definition of a serious injury in
police data can include more moderate injuries such as severe cuts which do not require admission
to hospital.

There are a wider set of contextual data to consider here as well:

• Overall Accident and Emergency (https://digital.nhs.uk/data-and-information/publications/

statistical/hospital-accident--emergency-activity/2018-19) attendances have been rising steadily
over time, and by 4% between 2017/18 and 2018/19. Table 16 in the main tables sheet (from
the link above), shows a breakdown of A&E attendances by patient group (one of which is road
traffic accident). In 2018/19 NHS Digital have introduced a new reporting system for A&E data
which has led to a significant increase in ‘not known’ group in this table and therefore we cannot
make a time series comparison to previous years.

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 25

Evaluating the accuracy of severity and injury based approaches with hospital data

As part of a STATS19 review strand (please see the STATS19 review section for further details),
the following evaluation was completed in reviewing the severity and injury based approaches to
classifying casualty severity by comparing police recorded data with hospital data.

Under a data sharing agreement with NHS Digital, the Department holds hospital episode statistics
(HES) on patients admitted to hospital following a road traffic accident in England up to and
including 2016. This is to match with STATS19 police recorded road casualties to identify casualties
that were clinically seriously injured, the type of injuries they sustained, and how well this maps to
the recorded severity in STATS19. 2016 saw the introduction of CRASH in most CRASH forces, as
a result for the analysis of HES to STATS19, one year’s dataset is used (2016).

Comparison of severity

Table 1: For CRASH and non-CRASH police forces, proportion of MAIS 1-2 and MAIS3+ that
were categorised as serious or slightly injured in STATS19, in 2016

There is not a perfect correlation between severity recorded in CRASH and non-CRASH forces,
and with the MAIS categories as there is currently no lookup from the European Commission to
breakdown the MAIS categories. Therefore, the current comparison of serious casualties with
MAIS3+ categories and slight casualties with MAIS1-2 is the best comparison available despite
slight differences in the definitions between the two datasets.

Overall, out of the MAIS3+ clinically serious casualties linked with Stats19, 82% were successfully
identified as serious in the injury based approach, compared to 78% for the non-injury based
approach: the injury based method has a higher sensitivity (proportion of true positives). However,
conversely, out of those with MAIS 1-2, 42% were rightly classified as slight in the injury based
approach, compared to 46% in the non-injury based approach: the injury based approach has
therefore lower specificity (proportion of true negatives). Both approaches perform quite well for
identification of serious, but less well for identification of slights. Therefore, while the injury based
approach is more likely to result in an accurate classification of serious cases, it is also more likely
to wrongly classify a slight injury as serious.

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 26

Comparison of injuries

In CRASH forces, comparing the injury used in the police data to the injuries in hospital provides a
good way to evaluate whether the list is achieving a correct classification.

Table 2: Injury description comparison in HES compared to injuries used by CRASH police
forces, in 2016

CRASH injuries
Fractured
Severe head Deep cuts / Fractured Other chest arm, Fractured
Broken neck Internal Multiple Severe chest injury, penetrating pelvis or upper Loss of arm or injury, not collarbone, lower leg, Shallow cuts / Sprains and Whiplash or Other head
or back injuries severe injuries injury unconscious wound leg leg (or part) bruising hand ankle, foot bruising strains neck pain Other injury injury Shock Grand Total

Broken neck or back 116 18 39 8 7 16 139 3 17 25 17 83 30 52 129 17 7 723

Internal injuries 42 59 77 34 27 19 44 3 65 56 32 65 14 35 165 17 5 759
multiple severe injuries 14 1 2 0 1 0 1 0 1 1 1 3 1 3 15 0 0 44
Severe chest injury 67 33 54 20 6 12 37 0 116 56 29 92 24 49 139 14 8 756
Severe head injury unconscious 37 13 69 6 127 32 25 2 11 31 26 79 14 20 130 88 8 718
Deep cuts / penetrating wound 35 18 51 7 10 111 41 5 20 91 92 277 31 45 254 56 14 1,158
Fractured pelvis or upper leg 12 15 32 3 7 2 145 4 3 8 52 11 10 7 70 5 3 389
HES Injuries
Loss of arm or leg (or part) 1 0 1 0 0 0 0 5 0 2 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 10
Other chest injury, not bruising 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 1
Fractured arm, co larbone, hand 27 10 54 2 2 13 16 4 25 317 61 96 31 29 179 16 6 888
Fractured lower leg ankle foot 11 4 24 0 4 14 40 4 10 24 373 80 21 20 195 15 3 842
Sha low cuts / bruising 39 24 37 9 7 43 45 0 49 115 106 535 91 122 333 98 25 1,678
Sprains and strains 5 3 16 1 2 9 23 2 10 35 32 34 8 9 39 2 1 231
Whiplash or neck pain 2 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 2 2 0 5 3 13 6 1 0 36
Other injury 0 0 0 0 0 2 1 2 0 1 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 9
Grand Total 408 198 457 90 200 274 557 34 329 764 821 1,360 278 404 1,658 330 80 8,242

Source DfT STATS19 and NHS Digi al

Very Serious Text Red text highlights the highest number of records captured in HES, for each CRASH injury
Moderately Serious Black boxes indicate the same injury category in both the CRASH and the HES datasets
Less Serious
Slight Where the red values are also in the black boxes most CRASH injuries are captured in the same category in the HES dataset.
Less well captured CRASH injuries are chest injuries, sprains and strains, whiplash and multiple severe injuries.

Mapping the HES injury descriptions to the most similar description from the CRASH injury list
allows a comparison of the most common injury in the two datasets from the linked data. Table
2 provides a comparison of the most common injury descriptions from the HES data and the
STATS19 (CRASH) data. The red highlighted figures show the most common HES injury for each
CRASH injury. Note that this is based on one year of data from CRASH forces only and therefore
underlying numbers for some injuries are small, and this is based on an indicative grouping of HES
injuries, so caution should be used when interpreting the figures.

Table 2 indicates that some injury types are detected by officers more accurately than others.
Injuries such as broken neck or back, deep cuts / penetrating wound, internal injuries, fractures,
severe head injury and shallow cuts / bruising are reasonably well identified, whereas others seem
more unreliable. Notably, chest injury, sprains and strains, multiple severe injuries, whiplash or neck
pain and shock seem to be used poorly by comparison.

There will inevitably be differences in the recording of injuries by police forces at the scene of
an accident to the final diagnosis received at the hospital. Police officers make the best possible
judgement at the scene of the accident without the aid of medical equipment to diagnose an injury.
Casualties may get better or worse from the time they have had a road accident to the time arriving
at hospital, as a result, there could be differences in diagnosis. The injury list provides the best
possible indication of the injury and level of severity at the scene of the road accident.

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 27

Conclusion on the evaluation of linked HES and STATS19 datasets

Further evaluation of the severity and injury based approaches to classifying casualty severity
using linked data with hospital records is required, using a longer time series of data.

The injury-based approach has the possibility to compute something more objective and closer
to medical definitions than the severity approach. Evaluation of the injury-based approach shows
that while the injury based approach is more likely to result in an accurate classification of serious
cases, it is also more likely to wrongly classify a slight injury as serious.

Extra detail from injury-based reporting is valuable in matching to hospital data and determining the
severity of casualties.

STATS19 review

Road accident data is collected from the police with the STATS19 collection. As with any collection system, it needs to be
periodically reviewed to keep up with changes in technology, to make improvements to completeness and accuracy, and to
reduce the reporting burden.

STATS19 is currently under review, having previously been reviewed in 2008. This process is overseen by the Standing
Committee on Road Accident Statistics (SCRAS) (https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/committees-and-user-groups-on-
transport-statistics/the-transport-statistics-user-group).

The review is seeking to:

• Make recommendations for modifications to STATS19 variables with a view to improving the quality/value of the data to
users and to reducing reporting burdens on the police.

• Identify areas where the STATS19 specification can be streamlined and modernised in order to reduce burdens,
including improving validation at source and therefore overall increase the quality of data collected and speed up the
ability to report/ produce findings.

• Consider the scope and opportunities for better use of technology, data sharing and matching to modernise road
casualty data. This is both with a view to reducing the amount of data needing to manually rather than automatically
input by the police, but also to enrich the data available to generate insight to improve road safety interventions.

• Develop a roadmap for any longer-term data changes needed to improve the evidence base for road safety
interventions.

Topics in the review include:

• The completeness and quality of collisions data – including types of vehicles and the quality of location data

• Whether any changes should be made to the recording of casualties

• The Contributory Factors list

• Improvements to methodology, data processing, reporting and dissemination

• Future data strategy for STATS19 by making better use of data linking and other sources to reduce burden and enrich
the data

The review will run through 2020, having been delayed due to Covid-19, before making recommendations on modifications to
the data collection which we will consult on. For further information please contact: STATS19REVIEW@dft.gov.uk

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 28

Compensation recovery unit data

The Compensation Recovery Unit (CRU) works with insurance companies, solicitors and
Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) customers, to recover:

• amounts of social security benefits paid as a result of an accident, injury or disease, if a

compensation payment has been made (the Compensation Recovery Scheme)

• costs incurred by NHS hospitals and Ambulance Trusts for treatment from injuries from road
traffic accidents and personal injury claims (Recovery of NHS Charges)

By far the largest number of cases they deal with are motor related. The table below shows a slight
increase in cases in 2018/19 compared to 2017/18 but the number of cases is still lower than in
previous years. This might suggest either a reduction in injury accidents since 2016/17 and/or a
change in the insurance/claims market. All other things being equal, CRU data suggests we would
not expect to see much change in injury accidents in 2018/19.

Table 3: Number of cases registered to Compensation recovery unit

Year Motor Total

Source for CRU
2010/11 790,999 987,381
data
2011/12 828,489 1,041,150
2012/13 818,334 1,048,309
Transparency data on
2013/14 772,843 1,016,801 the performance of the
2014/15 761,878 998,359 Compensation Recovery
2015/16 770,791 981,324 Unit is published by DWP
2016/17 780,324 978,816 at: https://www.gov.uk/
2017/18 650,019 853,615 government/publications/
2018/19 660,608 862,356 compensation-recovery-
unit-performance-data/
compensation-recovery-
unit-performance-data
Motor Insurance Claims Statistics

The Association of British Insurers (https://www.abi.org.uk/news/news-

articles/2018/03/average-motor-insurance-claim-at-a-record-level-says-the-abi/) collects aggregate data
from all its members on the number and type of claims, and therefore has data on the number of
motor insurance claims. Although the underlying data is not currently freely available, ABI data
shows: ‘The number of [motor] personal injury claims in 2018 fell slightly on 2017, with 312,000
claims settled.’ Other things being equal, we therefore might expect a slight fall in the number of
injury accidents in 2018.

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 29

Road Traffic Statistics

Provisional road traffic statistics for 2019 show that there was a 0.5% increase in miles travelled
on Britain’s roads, after remaining similar between 2017 and 2018 with a small increase of 0.3%.
Other things being equal, this would suggest we should not expect much change in the number of
injury accidents in 2019 compared to 2018. However, there are a wide range of other factors which
influence road casualties.

Conclusions on coherence

Police reported road casualty data is only a subset of all road casualties.

In terms of changes into 2019, of the sources available, they would suggest little change or a slight
fall would be expected compared to 2018 in total injury accidents.

The Stats19 review will aim to improve the estimate of both the overall size of under-reporting and
any further steps we can take to improve this, and what further work can be done to provide a
better assessment of the coherence in trends from these different sources.

The data used as the basis for these statistics are therefore not a complete record of all personal
injury road accidents, and this should be borne in mind when using and analysing the figures.
Furthermore, police data on road accidents, whilst not perfect, remain the most detailed, complete
and reliable single source of information on road casualties covering the whole of Great Britain, in
particular for monitoring trends over time, and remains well regarded in international comparisons.

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 30

Changes in reporting systems used by police forces
Background on the change

Approximately half of English police forces adopted the CRASH (Collision Recording and Sharing)
system for recording reported road traffic collisions at the end of 2015 or the first part of 2016,
although Surrey has been using the system since November 2012. In addition, the Metropolitan
Police Service (MPS) switched to a new reporting system called COPA (Case Overview
Preparation Application), which went live to police officers from
November 2016. Definitions

In 2019, 10 police forces adopted CRASH. This includes all the CRASH: Collision Recording
and Sharing system. This is
Scottish police forces, Sussex and Lancashire.
a centralised system used by
some police forces to record
The remaining forces use a wide variety of systems to report
road traffic collisions.
accidents, in which police officers use their own judgement and
COPA: Case Overview
guidance to determine directly the severity of a casualty (‘slight’ or
Preparation Application.
‘serious’). This is a system used by the
Metropolitan Police Service to
In contrast CRASH and COPA are injury-based severity reporting record road traffic collisions.
systems where the officer records the most severe injury for the
casualty (Table 4 shows the link between injury and severity as used in
the CRASH system). The injuries are then automatically converted to a severity level from ‘slight’
to ‘serious’.

Eliminating the uncertainty in determining severity that arises from the officer having to make their
own judgement means that the new severity level data observed from these systems using injury
based methods is expected to be more accurate than the data from other systems.

Table 4: Classification of injury severity using the CRASH reporting system

Injury in CRASH Detailed severity Severity classification
Deceased Killed Killed
Broken neck or back Very Serious Serious
Severe head injury, unconscious Very Serious Serious
Severe chest injury, any difficulty breathingVery Serious Serious
Internal injuries Very Serious Serious
Multiple severe injuries, unconscious Very Serious Serious
Loss of arm or leg (or part) Moderately Serious Serious
Fractured pelvis or upper leg Moderately Serious Serious
Other chest injury (not bruising) Moderately Serious Serious
Deep penetrating wound Moderately Serious Serious
Multiple severe injuries, conscious Moderately Serious Serious
Fractured lower leg / ankle / foot Less Serious Serious
Fractured arm / collarbone / hand Less Serious Serious
Deep cuts / lacerations Less Serious Serious
Other head injury Less Serious Serious
Whiplash or neck pain Slight Slight
Shallow cuts / lacerations / abrasions Slight Slight
Sprains and strains Slight Slight
Bruising Slight Slight
Shock Slight Slight

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 31

Table 5: Adoption dates for CRASH or COPA by police force
Police Force System Used Adoption Date
Bedfordshire CRASH April 2016
Cambridgeshire CRASH May 2016
Central CRASH April 2019
City of London CRASH November 2015
Cumbria CRASH January 2016
Devon and Cornwall CRASH December 2015
Dumfies and Galloway CRASH April 2019
Durham CRASH March 2016
Essex CRASH November 2015
Fife CRASH April 2019
Gloucestershire CRASH November 2015
Grampian CRASH April 2019
Hertfordshire CRASH April 2016
Humberside CRASH January 2016
Kent CRASH January 2016
Lancashire CRASH December 2018
Lothian and Borders CRASH April 2019
Metropolitan Police Service COPA Live to police officers in November 2015
Norfolk CRASH February 2016
Northern CRASH April 2019
Northumbria CRASH April 2016
South Yorkshire CRASH January to February 2013, then January 2016 onwards
Strathclyde CRASH April 2019
Staffordshire CRASH May 2015
Suffolk CRASH February 2016
Surrey CRASH November 2012
Sussex CRASH April 2019
Tayside CRASH April 2019
Warwickshire CRASH November 2015
West Mercia CRASH December 2015
West Midlands CRASH November 2015

Note that adoption dates are indicative as there can be phased introduction of new systems during transitions

Table 5 shows the police forces which use or have used either CRASH or COPA and the dates
from which these systems have been used.

Impact on trends

Following the introduction of CRASH and COPA, the number of casualties recorded as serious
has increased in Great Britain. Chart 15 shows the number of reported serious road casualties by
police force over time, from two years before to two years after Injury Based Reporting Systems
(IBRS) were introduced (year introduced, index = 100).

Chart 15: Reported serious road casualties by police force, two years before to two years
after injury based reporting systems were introduced
180
Metropolitan Police
160

South Yorkshire
140
Devon and Cornwall
120
Durham
100
Non-IBRS1

80

60

40
year injury based system
20 introduced
(index = 100)
0
Y-2 Y-1 Y Y+1 Y+2
1 Forces not using injury based reporting systems (IBRS). The non -IBRS forces have been given an index year of 2016 for comparison
as this is when most forces moved over to IBRS.

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 32

Chart 15 shows that the size of the increase in serious casualties varies across police forces
following the introduction of injury based reporting systems. A comparison line for non-IBRS
forces has been included to show how reported serious casualties have changed in these forces.
Some forces (such as the Metropolitan Police Service) show a more marked increase in serious
casualties than others, while other forces (such as Durham) show a more stable trend in serious
casualties over time. Devon and Cornwall and South Yorkshire have also been highlighted in the
chart above to illustrate the variety of trends observed.

The differences in the impact of the introduction of injury based reporting systems is likely to
depend on the practices within a police force that were in place before these new systems were
introduced. For example, Durham have stated that having a relatively low number of casualties
each year allows them to extensively validate how the severity of each casualty reflects the injury
received, and that their previous system for severity recording was very similar to the CRASH
approach. Whereas, larger forces might not be able to carry out extensive severity reviews and
there might be more differences in practices between the large numbers of officers recording
accidents.

Adjusting time series

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) Methodology Advisory Service have completed analysis
to quantify the effect of the introduction of injury reporting systems (CRASH and COPA) on the
number of slight and serious injuries reported to the police. The final methodology paper was
published alongside 2018 main results in July 2019 (https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/
reported-road-casualties-great-britain-main-results-2018) and is complemented by the Annex
published alongside this publication. The final paper addresses feedback received on the interim
report published alongside the 2017 annual report in September 2018, and confirms the use of a
logistic regression approach to adjust severity figures to account for the effect of injury reporting
systems while controlling for other factors which predict severity.

The methodology developed by the ONS has been used to produce adjusted figures which
are presented alongside the actual reported figures in the main results publication tables. The
adjustments provide the statistically ‘expected’ number of serious and slight injuries (i.e. what might
be expected on average) if all forces were using injury based severity reporting approaches.

The adjustments are published for further breakdowns of slight and serious including speed limit,
road class, casualty road user type, casualty age, quarter, police force, and local authority. It is
expected that these adjustments will need to be provided for each year that there are police forces
using a non-injury based reporting system. When other police forces move over to an injury based
reporting system, the model will be reviewed and this will be taken into account, which we expect
would be for at least the next couple of years.

In this report, the Department has also included adjusted figures by police force and local authority.
For more information on the method used to characterise police force trends please see the annex.

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 33

The annex also includes information on the final methodology, and guidance around quantifying
uncertainty when using record-level data.

Alongside the 2018 annual report, the Department has published the underlying adjusted figures
from the regression model available on data.gov.uk at (https://data.gov.uk/dataset/cb7ae6f0-4be6-
4935-9277-47e5ce24a11f/road-safety-data), in a look-up alongside our main data extracts, so that
users can explore the results of the severity adjustment at casualty level and provide any further
feedback. We will update this data when we publish the final 2019 annual report. Caution should be
used when interpreting adjustment at a detailed level. It is advised that adjustment figures are used
when users are looking at trends over time, for individual records and totals the unadjusted figures
can be used.

Your feedback

We welcome your feedback on this approach, specifically how you are using these statistics and
whether this meets your needs. Please contact us at roadacc.stats@dft.gov.uk.

Online self-reporting
Online self-reporting is part of a wider project for digital public contact called Single Online Home
funded by the Home Office to allow people involved in road traffic accidents to report the collision
to the police online should they choose to do so rather than having to physically report it at a police
station.

The principle of online reporting is to make it easier for members of the public to report accidents.
It is expected that the introduction of online reporting will affect the number of non-fatal (and
particularly slight) casualties reported and therefore impact the total for Great Britain, as the public
will have more reporting options available to them. This is particularly likely to impact numbers for
slight injuries, which might not have been reported otherwise. Serious injuries, on the other hand,
are expected to be less impacted by this change since the police are more likely to physically
attend the scene of serious accidents or for them to already be otherwise reported to the police. No
change is expected to be found for fatal accidents as these cases are more likely to be attended at
the scene and thoroughly investigated.

In addition to the overall volume, the introduction of online reporting is also likely to impact the
nature of the collisions reported, for example by road user type.

The Department is starting work as part of the STATS19 review to assess the scale of the
discontinuity caused by the introduction of online reporting so far, and consider how to adjust for
this as more forces roll it out. The rest of this section gives a high-level overview of the changes
introduced by online reporting.

The forces that introduced online reporting of collisions through the Single Online Home project are
listed below:
Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 34
 Force Date online reporting introduced in SOH
Metropolitan Police Service October 2016
City of London October 2016
Thames Valley January 2018
Hampshire January 2018
Derbyshire August 2018
Merseyside October 2018
Surrey December 2018

Although Essex adopted online reporting in April 2016, it is not part of the Single Online Home
(SOH) project and is excluded from this analysis. The City of London Police has a low number
of accidents and therefore cannot be included in this analysis to quantify the impact of online
reporting. For the rest of this section, forces other than the City of London and Essex (see list
above) will be compared to forces that have not introduced online reporting.

Changes in trends by severity

Following the introduction of online reporting, the Metropolitan Police Service saw an increase in
the total number of casualties of all severities (+7.7% between 2016 and 2017). Derbyshire and
Hampshire saw a smaller decrease between 2017 and 2018 in all casualties than forces that did
not use online reporting between 2017 and 2018. Merseyside and Surrey who introduced online
reporting late in 2018, saw a larger decrease in 2019 (8.3% and 6.4% respectively) than forces
who have not adopted online reporting.
Number of casualties in reported road accidents, by police force, 2016-2019

Number of casualties Percentage change

Police Force 2016 2017 2018 2019 2016-17 2017-18 2018-19
Force adopting online reporting end 2016
Metropolitan Police 29,902 32,200 30,318 29,894 7.7% -5.8% -1.4%
Forces adopting online reporting in 2018 (up to Sep)
Derbyshire 2,570 2,126 2,077 2,191 -17.3% -2.3% 5.5%
Thames Valley 6,580 5,567 5,105 4,587 -15.4% -8.3% -10.1%
Hampshire 5,477 5,089 4,931 4,578 -7.1% -3.1% -7.2%
Total 14,627 12,782 12,113 11,356 -12.6% -5.2% -6.2%
Forces adopting online reporting in 2018 (from Oct)
Merseyside 3,576 3,006 3,060 2,805 -15.9% 1.8% -8.3%
Surrey 5,021 4,614 4,172 3,905 -8.1% -9.6% -6.4%
Total 8,597 7,620 7,232 6,710 -11.4% -5.1% -7.2%
1
Forces not adopting online reporting 122,912 113,681 106,409 101,129 -7.5% -6.4% -5.0%
Source: STATS19
1. Essex and City of London are excluded from this table

The Department for Transport is not yet able to reliably differentiate between self-reported
casualties over the counter and online in the data. Therefore, the rest of this section is contrasting
all self-reported cases (whether over the counter or online) with cases attended by the police at the
scene. Note that there is likely to be some switch from over the counter to online reporting: some
members of the public who would have gone to a police station to report are likely to do so online
instead. However, overall any large increase in the number of self-reported cases is likely to be
Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 35
attributed to the introduction of online reporting.

Number of casualties in self-reported road accidents, by police force, 2016-2019

Number of casualties Percentage change

Police Force 2016 2017 2018 2019 2016-17 2017-18 2018-19
Force adopting online reporting end 2016
Metropolitan Police 4,992 6,748 8,256 9,897 35.2% 22.3% 19.9%
Forces adopting online reporting in 2018 (up to Sep)
Derbyshire 599 554 643 694 -7.5% 16.1% 7.9%
Thames Valley 977 742 1,099 1,288 -24.1% 48.1% 17.2%
Hampshire 785 850 845 822 8.3% -0.6% -2.7%
Total 2,361 2,146 2,587 2,804 -9.1% 20.5% 8.4%
Forces adopting online reporting in 2018 (from Oct)
Merseyside 537 535 786 732 -0.4% 46.9% -6.9%
Surrey 693 572 597 801 -17.5% 4.4% 34.2%
Total 1,230 1,107 1,383 1,533 -10.0% 24.9% 10.8%
1
Forces not adopting online reporting 27,672 27,804 26,691 27,327 0.5% -4.0% 2.4%
Source: STATS19
1. Essex and City of London are excluded from this table

Across forces that have not adopted online reporting, casualties in self-reported accidents fell by
4.0% from 2017 to 2018 and rose by 2.4% between 2018 and 2019.

The size of the change for forces adopting online reporting has varied for each force. In the
Metropolitan Police Service (MPS), which adopted online reporting at the end of 2016, casualties
in self-reported accidents rose by 35% between 2016 and 2017, by 22% from 2017 to 2018 and by
20% from 2018 to 2019.

Of the forces that adopted online reporting in 2018 (January to September), Derbyshire and
Thames Valley saw large increases in the number of casualties in self-reporting accidents between
2017 and 2018 (16% and 48% respectively). In both forces there was a smaller increase from
2018 to 2019, but still higher than the increase in forces that have not adopted online reporting.
Hampshire experienced a reduction in casualties in self-reported accidents since the introduction of
online reporting.

Of the forces that introduced online in 2018 (October to December), Merseyside recorded a
reduction in the casualties from 2018 to 2019 of 6.9%. Surrey, on the other hand, had a large
increase of 34% from 2018 to 2019. This was similar to the increase in the MPS (35%) in their first
year of using online reporting.

This suggests that online reporting results in more casualties being reported than would otherwise
have been the case, however there are differences between forces.

The below series of charts show the impact of the introduction of online reporting in the proportion
and number of self-reported casualties by severity over time. Serious and slight injuries have been
adjusted to account for changes in the severity reporting systems. More information on the change
and adjustment process is available in the 2018 annual report. The change to online reporting is
indicated by the dotted grey line.

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 36

 Derbyshire - % of casualties in self-reported accidents Derbyshire - Casualties in reported road accidents
50
Serious casualties Self reported Attended by the police
% of casualties in self-reportrf accidents

Slight casualties 250

All casualties
40

Number of casualties
200

30
150

20
100

10
50

0 0
Mar Jun Sep Dec Mar Jun Sep Dec Mar Jun Sep Dec Mar Jun Sep Dec Mar Jun Sep Dec Mar Jun Sep Dec
2017 2018 2019 2017 2018 2019

Hampshire - % of casualties in self-reported accidents Hampshire - Casualties in reported road accidents

30
Serious casualties
% of casualties in self-reportrf accidents

Self reported Attended by the police

Slight casualties
All casualties 500

400

Number of casualties
20

300

10 200

100

0 0
Mar Jun Sep Dec Mar Jun Sep Dec Mar Jun Sep Dec Mar Jun Sep Dec Mar Jun Sep Dec Mar Jun Sep Dec
2017 2018 2019 2017 2018 2019

Metropolitan police - % of casualties in self-reported Metropolitan police - Casualties in reported road

40 accidents accidents
% of casualties in self-reportrf accidents

Serious casualties Self reported Attended by the police

Slight casualties 3,000
All casualties
30 2,500
Number of casualties

2,000
20
1,500

1,000
10

500

0 0
Jun Dec Jun Dec Jun Dec Jun Dec Jun Dec Jun Dec Jun Dec Jun Dec
2016 2017 2018 2019 2016 2017 2018 2019

Thames Valley - % of casualties in self-reported Thames Valley - Casualties in reported road accidents
Serious casualties accidents
40
Self reported Attended by the police
% of casualties in self-reportrf accidents

Slight casualties
600
All casualties
30 500
Number of casualties

400
20
300

200
10
100

0 0
Mar Jun Sep Dec Mar Jun Sep Dec Mar Jun Sep Dec Mar Jun Sep Dec Mar Jun Sep Dec Mar Jun Sep Dec
2017 2018 2019 2017 2018 2019

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 37

 Merseyside - % of casualties in self-reported accidents Merseyside - Casualties in reported road accidents
50 Serious casualties
% of casualties in self-reportrf accidents Self reported Attended by the police
Slight casualties
300
All casualties
40

Number of casualties
30 200

20
100
10

0 0
Mar Jun Sep Dec Mar Jun Sep Dec Mar Jun Sep Dec Mar Jun Sep Dec
2018 2019 2018 2019

Surrey - % of casualties in self-reported accidents Surrey - Casualties in reported road accidents

30 Serious casualties Self reported Attended by the police
% of casualties in self-reportrf accidents

Slight casualties
400
All casualties

Number of casualties
20 300

200
10

100

0 0
Mar Jun Sep Dec Mar Jun Sep Dec Mar Jun Sep Dec Mar Jun Sep Dec
2018 2019 2018 2019

In the MPS, the number of casualties in self-reported accidents in 2019 was 9,897 up from 8,256
in 2018, up from 6,748 in 2017 and 4,992 in 2016. Prior to the introduction of online reporting, less
than 20% of casualties a month were self-reported, this proportion is now over 30% a month and
the progressive increase has not yet levelled off.

In the MPS, Thames Valley, Derbyshire and Surrey, there is a clear increase in the proportion of
self-reported casualties which is progressive after the date of introduction. The impact of online
reporting is visible for their trends in slight casualties. For these forces, fluctuations in serious self-
reported casualties do not follow a clear upwards trend after the introduction of online reporting.
The pattern over time is similar for these forces despite their different starting points in terms of the
proportion of self-reported casualties before the introduction of online reporting (ranging from 10%
to 30%).

Hampshire and Merseyside, on the other hand, have not experienced a noticeable increase since
introducing online reporting.

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 38

Changes in trends by road user type

Since 2016, around 94% of casualties in self-reported road accidents each year are pedestrians,
pedal cyclists, motorcyclists or car occupants. Therefore, the following table shows the percentage
changes for these casualty types only.

Percentage change in casualties in self-reported road accidents, by police force and

road user type, 2016-2017 to 2018-2019

Car
Police Force Pedestrians Pedal cyclists Motorcyclists occupants Other
Forces adopting online reporting end 2016
Metropolitan Police from 2016-2017 45.0% 50.2% 40.8% 26.4% 2.7%
Metropolitan Police from 2017-2018 13.6% 9.6% 16.8% 34.2% 26.2%
Metropolitan Police from 2018-2019 5.6% 7.6% 75.2% 20.3% 27.3%
Forces adopting online reporting in 2018 (Jan-Sep)
Derbyshire from 2017-2018 33.9% 1.7% 27.0% 16.2% 1.8%
Thames Valley from 2017-2018 17.4% 27.7% 59.0% 78.0% 25.0%
Hampshire from 2017-2018 17.2% 3.3% -9.5% -11.8% 14.7%
Overall from 2017-2018 21.9% 11.7% 17.3% 27.9% 11.5%
Derbyshire from 2018-2019 6.5% 1.7% -4.3% 19.5% -19.3%
Thames Valley from 2018-2019 -9.7% 10.3% -11.3% 32.9% 10.0%
Hampshire from 2018-2019 -16.4% -3.9% 16.4% 0.4% 12.8%
Overall from 2018-2019 -7.1% 2.8% 1.1% 21.3% -1.5%
Forces adopting online reporting in 2018 (Oct-Dec)
Merseyside from 2018-2019 2.3% -14.3% -30.8% -1.9% -41.7%
Surrey from 2018-2019 16.0% 19.9% 100.0% 44.5% 12.9%
Overall from 2018-2019 7.4% 0.6% 40.4% 19.4% -20.3%
Forces not adopting online reporting1
Change from 2016-2017 4.4% 7.4% -3.9% -1.8% -2.2%
Change from 2017-2018 -3.1% -4.6% -7.4% -3.8% -3.3%
Change from 2018-2019 6.7% 2.6% -2.9% 2.3% -4.5%
Source: STATS19
1. Essex and City of London are excluded from this table

For forces that have not adopted online reporting, the year-on-year percentage changes between
2016 and 2017, 2017 and 2018 and 2018 and 2019 for all these casualty types range between a
reduction of 7% and an increase of 7%.

Between 2016 and 2017 in accidents that were self-reported online in the MPS, pedal cyclist
casualties increased by 50%, pedestrians by 45%, motorcyclists by 41%, and car occupants by
26%. For the second full year of online reporting in the MPS, car occupant casualties rose by 34%
and the increases for the other casualty types were smaller. In the third year car occupants rose by
20%.

For forces that adopted online reporting in 2018 up to the end of September, Derbyshire saw the
biggest increase for pedestrians (34%) and motorcyclists (27%) while Thames Valley saw largest
increases for car occupants (78%) and motorcyclists (59%).

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 39

For the two forces that adopted online reporting in 2018 after September, Surrey saw increases for
all casualty types: pedestrians (16%), pedal cyclists (20%), motorcyclists (100%) and cars (13%)
while Merseyside only saw largest increases for pedestrians (2.4%).

Generally, forces that have adopted online reporting have recorded increases for each of these
four casualty types much larger than for those forces that have not adopted online reporting. These
differences might reflect differences in travel behaviours of the population of these police forces
and therefore the type of accidents that occur in each of them. For example, the increase in the
MPS is particularly large for vulnerable road users (pedestrians, pedal cyclists, motorcyclists). The
exceptions to this are Merseyside and Hampshire.

Conclusion on the impact on trends

In summary, online reporting has resulted in more casualties being reported in most of the police
forces that have introduced this method of self-reporting compared to forces that have not. While
forces had different starting points in terms of the proportion of accidents that are self-reported,
trends over time in almost all these forces show a progressive increase in self-reported slight
casualties that has not yet levelled off. The size of the effect, and the road user groups most
impacted, differ between forces, and is likely to reflect the mix of travel patterns and accidents
in these police force areas. It also suggests that collisions involving vulnerable road users
(pedestrians, pedal cyclists and motorcyclists) are reported more online.

Because of the number and size of forces having adopted online reporting, this is already
impacting the national figures. Online reporting tools delivered through the Single Online Home
project will be made available to more police forces in the future and as a result the Department
anticipates that this will impact even more the total number of accidents and casualties reported
as the system is adopted. Other forces have already planned to adopt online reporting in the near
future. It is therefore expected that the discrepancy in data trends caused by the introduction of
online reporting will expand in the future.

The Department will explore further how to estimate the impact of the introduction of online
reporting as part of the STATS19 review. This will include research to understand differences in
practices of back office staff between forces where online reporting is available, and review the
STATS19 requirements of online reporting from a user perspective.

Impact on quality

The introduction of online reporting has also impacted the quality of data received by the
Department. It is believed that the introduction of online reporting has introduced a different
interpretation for unknown values (for example, unknown to the public as opposed to unknown
by the police) that has not been subsequently populated by the police. As a result, the number
of unknown values on some variables like left hand drive vehicle, special conditions at site and
carriageway hazards, has increased compared to previous years.

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 40

The specific variables affected are the following:

Vehicle level variables

• Skidding / overturning
• Hit object in carriageway
• Vehicle leaving carriageway
• Vehicle location
• First object hit off carriageway
• Junction location of vehicle
• Was vehicle left hand drive?
• First point of impact
• Towing and articulation

Accident level variables

• Weather conditions
• Junction control
• Carriageway type
• Pedestrian crossing
• Special conditions at site
• Carriageway hazards
• Junction type
• Road surface conditions

The vast majority of the unknown values above are observed in the Metropolitan Police Service,
however there are indications that some, including weather conditions and carriageway type, are
also observed in other online reporting forces.

Comparisons with earlier years for these variables should therefore be made with caution. This is
indicated as a footnote in published tables where relevant.

In particular, there has been an issue in the recording of the left hand drive information for vehicles
in the Metropolitan Police Service. There has been a large increase in unknowns for this field
since 2016, which is linked to the introduction of online reporting, and a large increase in vehicles
recorded as left hand drive since 2016, which is believed to be linked to the introduction of COPA.
This is indicated in RAS40005, which has been amended to include two tables for 2017 and 2018:
one for Great Britain and one for Great Britain excluding the Metropolitan Police Service.

The Department is actively engaged with the project team to improve the capture of the geographic
location of the collision and to add additional validation to improve the quality of online self-reported
data.

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 41

Publication timetable
Reported road casualties Great Britain, provisional results 2019
contains the first release of provisional headline accident and
Next release
More detailed tables and
casualty figures for 2019. The publication title has been updated from
analysis of the 2019 statistics
‘Reported road casualties Great Britain, main results’ to more clearly will be published in the final
reflect that the publication contains provisional data. The timetable of Reported Road Casualties
publications in 2020 continues to be a large improvement on 2017 and Great Britain: Annual Report
2019 in September this year.
2018, where the main results publication did not go ahead, reflecting
the efforts of both police forces and the DfT team.

This will be followed by the publication of the 2019 annual report in

September 2020.

The Department aims to publish mid-year estimates for 2020 in November 2020. Feedback from
users and examples of any impact of the reduced frequency from quarterly to in-year estimates are
welcome at roadacc.stats@dft.gov.uk.

Data supply from forces

There have been significant challenges in attempting to close the 2019 dataset.

The timing of the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has impacted forces and local authorities
and their ability to process STATS19 data and respond to enquiries due to: reprioritisation, staff
on furlough and physical difficulties of access to places of work, equipment to work at home and
software.

Avon and Somerset have experienced system issues that impacted their ability to supply data to
their local authorities, who provide DfT with completed records. As a result, there is some missing
data for December 2019.

The Metropolitan Police and TfL supplied December data on 01/07/2020. London’s road traffic
collision data remains provisional until the year is finalised and closed in August 2020.

The total number of accidents and casualties has been agreed with each police force as far as
possible. But, DfT have not been able to agree totals with some forces as they still have small
number of outstanding accident or casualty records. These issues account for approximately 200
accidents that fall in the following forces: Avon and Somerset, Essex, Lancashire, Metropolitan
Police and Staffordshire.

Consequently, the database has not been finalised for the year 2019 and all totals are provisional.
Figures in this release are based on the best available information at that time and DfT will continue
to gather the outstanding records. National validation will be conducted after the provisional release
and will include updates from local authorities and geographical validation that may require records
Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 42
to be transferred between police forces.

There are still records that require some updates to populate missing data or resolve conflicts
within the data. These may cause some small differences to the overall totals when viewed across
the provisional release tables.

The 2019 road safety database will be finalised before publication of the annual report in
September. No further amendments, additions or deletions to 2019 will take place once the
database has been finalised.

DfT are aware of 4 accidents that may contain at least one fatality that were not received in time
for this publication and will be included in the September Reported Road Casualties Great Britain
publication should they prove to be STATS19 reportable.

Police Scotland adopted the CRASH system during 2019, further analysis of data covering the
transition period will be carried out in August 2020 and feed into Road Casualties in Great Britain,
annual report: 2019.

Data tables
The main results publication includes key tables based on data reported by the police. The
following tables are provisionally updated:

• Accidents by speed limit, road class and severity, Great Britain (RAS10001)

• Casualties by road user type and severity, Great Britain (RAS30001)

• Casualties by speed limit, road user class and severity, Great Britain (RAS30006)

• Casualties by severity and police force area, Great Britain (RAS30007)

• Casualties by age band, road user type and severity, Great Britain (RAS30024)

• Casualties by severity, region and local authority, England (RAS30038)

A full list of tables in the road safety series and an index with web tables can be found at https://
www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment data/file/648083/reported-road-
casualties-gb-index-of-tables.xlsm.

Making our data easier to access

The Department wants to make road safety data easier for users to access and navigate, and has therefore carried out a review
of all published road accidents tables. The aim of this review was to enable users to get the tailored information they need while
reducing the number of tables published.

The Department is trialling a new road safety data download tool (https://roadtraffic.dft.gov.uk/custom-downloads/road-
accidents), for users to create bespoke reports. We will continue to improve this tool continuously to include more data and

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 43

 improve the user experience. If you have any feedback or issues with the tool please contact us at roadacc.stats@dft.gov.uk.
Some tables have been dropped as the same information is now available in this tool.

As announced in last year’s main results publication, some tables have also been dropped as part of this review because
information has been consolidated in tables, information was duplicated across tables, or they were identified as being rarely
used. For full details of specific tables dropped, please see the tables index: https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/
uploads/attachment_data/file/648083/reported-road-casualties-gb-index-of-tables.xlsm.

The objective of removing the number of tables that are made available through the tool, that are rarely used, or are redundant,
is to provide a better user experience to users by not having to navigate a very large number of tables. The complexity of
navigating the current set of tables faced by users in finding the information they need is shown by evidence from web analytics
that place our table index as one of the top tables downloaded for DfT statistics.

Any feedback is welcome at roadacc.stats@dft.gov.uk.

Background information
Tables providing more details of accidents and casualties are available at: https://www.gov.uk/
government/collections/road-accidents-and-safety-statistics.
Further information
Provisional in-year reported road casualty statistics are
A full list of the definitions used in this
published throughout the year. Provisional estimates for publication can be found here: www.gov.
the first half of 2019 were published in November 2019. In- uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/
attachment data/file/462818/reported-
year statistical releases can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/
road-casualties-gb-notes-definitions.pdf.
government/collections/road-accidents-and-safety-statistics.

National Statistics are produced to high professional standards Further information on Reported Road
as set out in the Code of Practice for Statistics. They Casualties Great Britain, including
information about the variables
undergo quality assurance reviews to ensure that they meet
collected on the STATS19 form,
customer needs. Further information on the National Statistics historical publications and factsheets,
designation of this statistical release can be found here: https:// can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/
government/collections/road-accidents-
www.gov.uk/government/publications/road-accidents-and-
and-safety-statistics.
safety-statistics-guidance/national-statistics-status-of-reported-
road-casualties-statistics.
Feedback
Details of Ministers and officials who receive pre-release
We welcome further feedback on any
access to these statistics up to 24 hours before release can aspects of the Department’s road safety
be found here: www.gov.uk/government/publications/road- statistics including content, timing, and
accident-and-safety-statistics-pre-release-access-list. format, via email to roadacc.stats@dft.
gov.uk

To hear more about DfT statistics publications as they are released please
follow us on Twitter via our @DfTstats account: http://www.twitter.com/DfTstats.
TWITTER, TWEET, RETWEET and the Twitter logo are trademarks of Twitter, Inc.
or its affiliates

Reported road casualties in Great Britain: provisional results 2019 - Page 44