In a year where New Zealand faced unprecedented change, road deaths have sadly remained largely the same.

With the final day of the year not yet done, provisional figures show 320 people have lost their lives in crashes this year. That is a reduction on the 352 deaths in 2019, but not when you factor in the massive drop in road deaths during the lockdown period in April.

“If you take the April lockdown out of the equation, that accounts for all the difference between 2020 and the previous year,” says AA Motoring Affairs General Manager Mike Noon.

“Road deaths for the other 11 months of the year have been slightly more than 2019, which is a very sad and disappointing result.”

“We had three years early in the last decade with less than 300 road deaths, so we know it’s possible to do a lot better. When Covid 19 first appeared and locked down the country there was some speculation that it may result in less deaths on the roads due to less driving taking place but this hasn’t ended up the case.”

Outside of the lockdown period, it is actually possible that there has been more driving this year than 2019, which could be part of the explanation for the stubbornly high road toll.

While there has been no international visitors arriving in New Zealand for most of the year there has also been no New Zealanders travelling overseas, and this is actually a bigger number than tourist arrivals through the winter months. So once the official data is available it may show that New Zealand has actually had more people within our shores and more travel on our roads this year than normal.

It’s important to remember that overseas drivers were at fault in less than 5% of fatal crashes in 2019 as well, so they have only ever been involved in a small proportion of crashes.

The question that always gets asked at this time is: what do we need to do to reduce our road deaths? But the AA would say that is actually two questions.

One part is what the Government and authorities can do, and some of the key things the AA wants to see are:

• Upgrading high-risk roads with things like barriers, wider centrelines and shoulders
• Investing more in road maintenance to keep roads up to standard
• Bringing the number of alcohol tests back up to previous levels and introducing roadside drug testing
• Ensuring all high-risk drink drivers are getting interlocks
• Lifting the safety standards of our fleet
• Ensuring young people are getting the support they need to learn to drive safely.

The other part of the road safety equation is what we can all do as individuals sharing the roads every day. Past AA Research Foundation work has shown that while half of fatal crashes involve extreme and reckless behaviour, the other half involve everyday people having a momentary lapse or mistake.

“No one is a perfect driver and if people are honest, we could all find at least one thing to do better in 2021.

“For some drivers that might be making sure they keep a bigger following distance, for others it might be slowing their speed to the conditions, or it could be not using your phone behind the wheel or not carrying on driving when they are feeling tired.

“The AA would encourage every driver to aim to make one change to be a bit safer behind the wheel in 2021. If all of us did that, it would add up to ultimately deliver less crashes and harm on our roads.”

For more information contact:

Mike Noon
Motoring Affairs General Manager
New Zealand Automobile Association
M. 021 659 704
E. mnoon@aa.co.nz