Road safety week, organised by the charity Brake is aimed at raising awareness and educating all road users about aspects of road safety.
Across Scotland and the rest of the UK, people will be raising awareness in a variety of activities. Everything from school children wearing brightly coloured clothing, to explain how cyclists can best be seen on the road. Workplace training to promote safer driving practice is available. This annual event takes great steps in making our roads safer through educating the general public.
The Scottish driving school located in Perth Scotland build into their driving lessons awareness and anticipation from day one. Hopefully the safe driving practice taught on their lessons will continue after their driving test is passed.
Distracted driving
Brake’s work on road safety week, has successfully run campaigns alongside Think! Who have been used to educate the public on key road safety messages. These campaigns attempt to deter drivers from ignoring laws relating to driver safety. Such as speeding, drink driving, or using a phone whilst driving. Campaigns are used not only on road safety week, but all year round. To support and explain the legislation they apply to. For example, the recent Think! campaign on distracted driving implored the public to ‘make the glove compartment the phone compartment’. With the advert ending with a reminder that those caught using their phone while driving face a £200 fine and 6 penalty points.
Use of mobile phones whilst driving
These campaigns appear to be quite successful in terms of altering public attitudes. The latest British Social Attitudes Survey (BSAS 35, 2017), 70% of drivers agreed that using a hand-held phone while driving was unacceptable, demonstrating a marked shift in attitudes compared with the previous 10 years. While this is a promising change during road safety week, it is likely that recent increases to fines and penalty points of drivers caught using phones contributed to this shift. Nevertheless, there is of course a difference between what an individual says is unacceptable and what they actually choose to do while driving.