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Letter to Mayor about roads policing
Dear Sadiq,
Reducing road death and injury through policing
Thank you for the conversation at Mayor’s Question Time on 21 July about reducing road death and injury through policing. I raised with you the number of investigations of fatal and serious collisions carried out by the Serious Collision Investigation Unit (SCIU).
In your answer to Mayor’s Question 2021/4431, you told me that the SCIU investigated 458 serious injury collisions and 205 fatal collisions between 2018 and 2020.[1]
This equates to 4.4 per cent of the 10,510 serious collisions and 61.9 per cent of the 331 fatal collisions recorded by Transport for London (TfL) in this period. [2] I am assuming that all fatal collisions are investigated by the SCIU and that the other 38.1 per cent are accounted for by fatal collisions that do not qualify according to the STATS19 definition (e.g. involving medical episodes, suicides and deaths occurring beyond 30 days from the crash).
If this is not correct and you have more specific data on collision investigations by the Metropolitan Police Service (MPS), I would be grateful to see that to better understand the SCIU workload.
You offered to take away the question of whether the SCIU should be investigating more of the serious collisions to ensure every opportunity is taken to learn from these terrible events and to avoid future repetition.
I realise that SCIU investigations are resource intensive and are carried out by officers with a deep understanding of the factors contributing to collisions. I appreciate too, that even if the number of serious injury collisions investigated by the SCIU doubled, this would still leave over 90% of serious injury collisions uninvestigated by the SCIU.
Road danger reduction campaigners often raise concern about their perception of victim blaming by some officers who provide STATS19 reports for collisions that are not investigated by the SCIU.
Is it possible to look into the training of officers conducting STATS19 investigations and whether they could receive training from the SCIU to raise awareness of the way that factors like speed can contribute to collisions happening and to ensure more accurate reporting of causes of collisions into STATS19?
Campaigners want to see robust processes to ensure the wider outcomes of STATS19 investigations are incorporated into the work of Transport for London (TfL) delivering Vision Zero.
I would appreciate learning how STATS19 investigations are quality assured and what processes are in place to ensure that what is learned from these MPS investigations is shared as widely as possible? Could you also tell me whether victim level of satisfaction surveys are conducted? If not, could they be?
I also raised the road policing dashboard that my colleague, Assembly Member Berry discussed with the former Commissioner at the London Assembly Plenary meeting in December 2021.[3] Could you provide an update on progress with delivering this dashboard?
Yours sincerely,
Caroline Russell
Green Party Member of the London Assembly
[1] Serious Collision Investigation Unit (1), 22 November 2021 /questions/2021/4431
[2] Road danger reduction dashboard and data, https://tfl.gov.uk/corporate/publications-and-reports/road-safety
[3] London Assembly Plenary transcript, 2 December 2021 /about-us/londonassembly/meetings/documents/b23729/Minutes%20-%20Appendix%201%20-%20Transcript%20of%20Agenda%20Item%203%20Thursday%2002-Dec-2021%2010.00%20London%20Assembly%20Ple.pdf?T=9
09 December 2022
Dear Caroline
Thank you for your letter to the Mayor of London, dated 4 August 2022 regarding reducing road death and injury through policing following your conversation on this topic at July’s session of Mayor’s Question Time. I have been asked by the Mayor to respond on his behalf
First, can I say how sorry I am for the delay in our response, my officials, with colleagues from the Transport for London Policing and Community Safety Team have been awaiting details from the Metropolitain Police Service (MPS) to answer the specific points you have raised.
Firstly, in relation to your specific question regarding an MPS road policing dashboard - I have been informed that the Transport for London Policing and Community Safety Team have developed a dashboard and that it is in its final stages of development – this will be shared with Road Danger Reduction stakeholders for their views. It will be launched in the new year, when I will be able to fully inform you about its implementation.
However, on your question related to the proportions of serious injury collisions between 2018 and 2020, the MPS have advised my officers that the information provided for MQ 2021/4431 related only to those collisions recorded in the Crime Recording Information System (CRIS) – and as such may not represent the totality of the investigations undertaken by the Serious Collisions Investigation Unit (SCIU). My officers are continuing to work with the MPS to procure information to better understand the SCIU workload, alongside the other points you have raised. We are yet to receive this information from the MPS.
The MPS have said that they would be very happy to meet with you to discuss these issues in more detail. Please contact [email protected] to set up a meeting with them if you wish.
Thank you for writing to the Mayor about this important issue. I am sorry that I have been unable to provide a more detailed response at this time – however, I have instructed my Office for Policing and Crime to provide an update to you as soon as possible.
Yours sincerely,
Sophie Linden
Deputy Mayor for Policing And Crime