A last chance to urge the Met to help reduce deaths by enforcing road safety laws

Demand more police enforcement on London's roads

Mayor of London's Office for Policing and Crime (MOPAC) is consulting on the draft police and crime plan for the period 2025 to 2029. We believe that it should contain more about the crime that occurs on London's roads. The consultation documents can be read on the MOPAC website.

The consultation ends on Wednesday 12th February and if you have time please could you write to: Consultation@mopac.london.gov.uk

...and ask MOPAC to include in the plan:

1. That the Met Police share the responsibility of traffic law enforcement with local police - there just are not enough road police officers to do an effective job of enforcement without involving local police in the boroughs.
2. Include road crime as part of efforts to tackle anti-social behaviour - do not overlook the huge impact that illegal and careless driving has on London's communities.
3. Ensure that crime strategies, surveys and forums include road crime in their thinking – it is vital to treat road crime as real crime.

If you would like to flesh out these points, more details of AVZ's response to the consultation are below - but just getting these points across will be very helpful.

The consultation closes at 23.59 on Wednesday 12 February
Respond to consultation@mopac.police.london.gov.uk

MOPAC draft police and crime plan: AVZ response

7th February 2025

Key points

• Road deaths increased in the last year in London whilst levels of enforcement have not.
• Almost half of speeding offences were cancelled while careless driving and using a mobile phone offences decreased.
• The Mayor is consulting on his police and crime plan for the next four years. It includes two paragraphs about road danger and how the Vision Zero plan that is being refreshed will set out the Metropolitan Police’s (Met’s/MPS) contribution and priorities.
• Reducing road danger and cycle theft deserve more priority in the police and crime plan. Our key calls include:
  • Sharing the responsibility of traffic law enforcement with local police
  • Including road crime in efforts to tackle anti-social behaviour
  • Do better and more to tackle cycle theft
  • Ensure crime strategies, surveys and forums include road crime – treating road crime as real crime.

Road deaths rose in 2024 with 110 people killed in reported road crashes in London. This is not of course the sole fault of the police but an increase in enforcement can help reduce the levels of danger on London’s roads. The Mayor’s draft Police and Crime Plan is open for consultation until 12 February. They need to hear from us all.

The Met (and other police services) has been clear that they are in tough times. And this is particularly true with road crime, which has struggled to be a priority for the Met. As seen below, progress has stalled or even reversed in key areas:

Speed enforcement.

• In 2023 almost half of all speed limit offences (47%) were cancelled.
• The share of enforcement on 20 and 30 mph roads (56%) does not match the much greater share of serious and fatal casualties (KSIs) which occur on those roads (93%). Speed enforcement would be 60% greater on 20 and 30 mph roads if it was proportionate to the KSI share on those roads. The great increase in speed enforcement from 2018 (much credit to Met and TfL) now seems to have peaked.

Road crime reporting.

In 2020, the Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime told the HMICFRS that “Specifically, I am keen to note that the MPS is the UK lead on online reporting, having the system in place for the public to upload dash cam footage to assist in road safety operations.”

If this was the case then, it certainly is not now. The Met have not been able to keep up with the volume of reports the public are submitting of law-breaking drivers; the Met does not even advertise this scheme. Other police services have invested and expanded their systems, including making them much more transparent. The Met has lagged behind in making use of this low-cost citizen-engaged method which has the potential to vastly increase road crime detection capacity.

Careless Driving.

Latest Home Office statistics show careless driving sanctions falling in London; 25% down in 2023 compared to 2022. This is the offence most likely to be reported by citizens submitting video reports of unsafe driving. It had been on the increase until 2023.

Transparency and accountability.

So proudly launched in April 2023, the London Vision Zero Enforcement Dashboard^[1] is out of date, contains inaccurate data and never had borough location data added, despite this being long promised.

Collision investigation.

Just over a year ago the Met told the London Assembly Police and Crime Committee that their Serious Collision Investigation Unit (SCIU) was the best in the country. Yet the Met has just announced that failings with arguably the most high-profile fatal crash in years resulted in the investigation being transferred to another department^[2].

Investigation outcomes.

Only summary data is published on prosecutions of fatal and serious injury collisions. We still do not know how often drivers are being prosecuted for seriously injuring pedestrians or cyclists. Most investigations are believed to end in No Further Action but the reasons are not being collated or produced.

Cycle theft

The Met plan was to be updated but a new plan was never published. The size of the Cycle Safety Team is now a fraction of what it was when the previous cycle security plan was published in 2010. TfL knows this is a priority but it does not appear to be a priority for the Met.

The three main objectives of the draft Police and Crime Plan

Here we summarise AVZ’s response to the Mayor’s draft Police and Crime Plan. This has three main objectives:

1. Reducing Violence and Criminal Exploitation
2. Increasing Trust and Confidence in the MPS
3. Improving the Criminal Justice System and Supporting Victims.

Objective 1 does not cover road danger or road crime.

The government’s definition of violent crime excludes over 95% of road crime; causing death/serious injury by driving and dangerous driving are the only motoring offences that qualify as violent crime. So, road danger and road crime are not prime concerns of Objective 1.

Objective 2. Increasing Trust and Confidence in the MPS has two key actions:

• Build trust through greater transparency and accountability.
• Support the MPS and build partnerships to make neighbourhoods safer.

In the section on Making London’s public spaces safer for all, the plan states:

The safety and security of transport and travelling in London is vital to how safe the city is and feels. Billions of journeys are made every year, most going without incident. While every journey should be safe – and feel safe – the Mayor and MOPAC recognise that this is not always the case. Some groups are more vulnerable to victimisation and harm or are more concerned about their safety and security when travelling on public transport, by foot or by bike.  MOPAC will work alongside the police, TfL and local authorities to make sure that travelling in the capital is safe and secure.

Londoners’ concern about their safety and security when travelling includes risk and harm on London’s roads caused by criminal, reckless and antisocial road-user behaviour. The MPS makes a significant contribution to keeping roads safe through its traffic enforcement activity and post-collision response (including incident response, collision investigation and improving justice and care for victims). The Mayor and MOPAC will oversee and support the MPS’s work to disrupt crime and prevent harm on the roads. The MPS is a key delivery partner in the Mayor’s Vision Zero Plan, working alongside TfL and local authorities, to eliminate all deaths and serious injuries on London’s roads by 2041. The Vision Zero Plan will be refreshed in 2025 and will set out the MPS’s ongoing contribution and priorities for tackling road danger.

See Appendix A for AVZ’s Met related calls for the next Vision Zero Action Plan. But here we would like to urge the Mayor and MOPAC to treat road crime as crime by:

1. Having Local Police share the responsibility for traffic law enforcement. It should not be just the remit of the Roads and Transport Policing Command. Communities deserve a local contact and local efforts to reduce road danger.
2. Including motoring offences in anti-social behaviour efforts.
3. Ensuring strategies, surveys and working groups/forums include road crime.

Objective 3:  Improving the Criminal Justice System and Supporting Victims

Our calls in this area include:

• Remember road crime in criminal justice. Motoring offences account for over half of all offences prosecuted at court in London. They raise more Victim Surcharge than any other offence. Yet road crime is tolerated.
• Ban more drivers. Fewer than 3% of those convicted at court for speeding are banned. Many, if not most of them, will have been summoned to court for extreme speeding (e.g. 50mph in a 30mph). The Mayor should ensure the justice system responds better, with police, prosecutors and judiciary aware of the harm caused.
• Treat road crime reporters as victims. Cyclists reporting close passes, including those which cause them much fear, are treated as witnesses, not victims, despite the Victim’s Code stating those suffering emotional harm qualify as victims. Not all road crime reporters will suffer emotional harm but many reporting a close pass will be. The online reporting portal should ask if the reporter has suffered emotional harm and treat those as victims.
• National Reform. London’s Vision Zero Action Plan included a list of national reforms on which London would lobby. This is needed even more now, including with increasing Fixed Penalty Notices (FPNs), with more money for local road danger reduction efforts, and a fairer share of the income raised by the Victim Surcharge on motoring offenders.

Appendix A. AVZ calls for the next London Vision Zero Action Plan: traffic law enforcement.

Whilst these are based on our calls in our 2024 London Mayoral Manifesto in the area of traffic law enforcement, we are updating them as the development of plan has been delayed.

Safe Road Users

• Commit to more speed enforcement. Speed enforcement in London has increased since 2018. And this is set to continue, with up to one million offences in 2024/25. Last year almost half speeding offences were cancelled. This must be addressed. And there is still less enforcement by the Met than by other police services (compared on per KSI basis). Worse, too little enforcement is on roads used by people walking and cycling. Speed enforcement should focus on the roads where KSIs occur. Over 90% of KSIs occur on 20 and 30 mph roads but only 53% of speed enforcement occurs there.
• Use borough police. Across London, additional police officers are being assigned to borough units but not to the Roads Transport Policing Command (now fewer than 800). Responsibility for safer roads needs to be shared more with borough police. Learn from Sweden where every police officer is required to do 20 minutes on traffic enforcement every day.
• Work with the community to report more offences. Londoners reported over 1,500 offences a month via RoadSafe^[3] in 2023. Staff have not been able to keep up with demand and the RoadSafe scheme is not publicised. London should invest more in processing online submissions, including sharing information with borough police (this is not done at present).
• Improve transparency and accountability. The London Vision Zero Enforcement Dashboard is a big step forward. But it is out of date, contains inaccurate information and has yet to provide data at the borough level.

Safe Vehicles

• Review HGV and bus KSI collisions. London has led the way with Direct Vision Standards in lorries and its bus safety programme. But deaths and serious injuries, whilst reduced, continue. An annual review of the fatal and serious injury HGV and bus collisions can help identify what more is needed.
• Tackle cycle theft. TfL reports 69% of non-cyclists are put off cycling by fear of their cycle being stolen. TfL and the Metropolitan Police need to do more to ensure the security of cycles, improve detection of cycle theft offences and restore bikes to their owners.

Post-collision response

• Prioritise serious injury investigation. Over ten people are reported seriously injured on London’s roads every day - over half were walking or cycling when hit. The London Assembly Police and Crime Committee examined police investigations into serious injury collisions. Responsibility is shared between different units with no overall coordination or priority. The Serious Collision Investigation Unit investigates all fatal and some life-threatening crashes; borough police conduct the at-scene investigation with all other serious injury collisions (>95%), with follow-up investigation managed by a desk-based unit. Londoners deserve better with more priority, transparency and accountability from collision investigation.
• Work with the community. Solicitors, campaigners and victims want to help and should be included on a collision investigation working group. They can help identify opportunities for improvement, including with obtaining evidence.
• Review No Further Action (NFA) decisions. Most serious injury collision investigations result in No Further Action. But the reasons for NFAs are not known (e.g. road defects, victim liability or if they are inconclusive due to lack of investigation). A review should start with serious injury cycle collisions and be published to gain public confidence.
• Tackle hit and run. Drivers choosing to abandon the seriously and fatally injured in hit and runs need to be caught and prosecuted for these callous crimes. Hit and run collisions have a disproportionate impact on people walking and cycling but at present, very little is known about these crashes, including how often the driver is identified. A more detailed response is needed by the police.
• Remember road crime in criminal justice. Motoring offences account for over half of all offences prosecuted at court in London. They raise more Victim Surcharge than any other offence. Yet road crime is tolerated.
• Ban more drivers. Fewer than 3% of those convicted at court for speeding are banned. Many, if not most of them, will have been summoned to court for extreme speeding (e.g. 50mph in a 30mph). The Mayor should ensure the justice system responds better, with police, prosecutors and judiciary aware of the harm caused.
• Treat road crime reporters as victims. Cyclists reporting close passes, including those which cause them much fear, are treated as witnesses, not victims, despite the Victim’s Code stating those suffering emotional harm qualify as victims. Not all road crime reporters will suffer emotional harm but many reporting a close pass will be. The online reporting portal should ask if the reporter has suffered emotional harm and treat those as victims.
• National Reform. London’s Vision Zero Action Plan included a list of national reforms on which London would lobby. This is needed even more now, including with increasing Fixed Penalty Notices (FPNs), with more money for local road danger reduction efforts, and a fairer share of the income raised by the Victim Surcharge on motoring offenders.

 

^[1] https://app.powerbi.com/view?r=eyJrIjoiMTMxMWM1ZjYtNTIxYy00OGQzLWFjYzItMmMyN2I3MzQ0YjQzIiwidCI6IjFmYmQ2NWJmLTVkZWYtNGVlYS1hNjkyLWEwODljMjU1MzQ2YiIsImMiOjh9

^[2] https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c03lgdzpw8go

^[3] https://www.met.police.uk/roadsafelondon/