The Timaru Herald THURSDAY, MAY 24, 1934. MAKING THE ROADS SAFE.

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXXVII, Issue 19807, 24 May 1934, Page 8

The Timaru Herald THURSDAY, MAY 24, 1934. MAKING THE ROADS SAFE.

Every motorist’who realises the menace' to his own safety . that haunts the roads of the Dominion, ought to applaud every effort that is made to make the roads safer for pedestrian • and vehicular traffic alike. The proposal of the Ministry of Transport to issue appeals to the motorists through messages attached to annual licenses, should win universal approval. The messages, we are informed, will carry appeals to motorists to exercise every care in an effort to reduce the yearly toll of life and limb taken by road accidents. It is pointed out that for the year ended March 31, 1933, there were 143 deaths from motor accidents, approximately 5000 persons injured from motor accidents, and approximately 30,000 motor accidents resulting in damage to property: “These are figures which to every motorist will carry their own significance,” the message proceeds. “They show the need for constant care on the road. To the motor-cyclist, particularly, an, appeal is made. Insurance records of the last five years show that with motor-cycles there is a higher traffic risk than with other motor vehicles. Recklessness on the road is likely to involve the rider and others, including young children, in death or injury, and some restraint is surely a small price for reducing these risks.” Synchronising with the determined efforts" being made in New Zealand to ensure that the roads are made reasonably safe, come reports from the Old Land that the consensus of opinion supports the considered conclusions of Ministerial heads of Transport Departments that the gravity of the road problem no one can question. Manifestly all sections of the community must make up their minds to certain facts. We are becoming a nation of motor-users and therefore the number of motor vehicles on the roads is bound to increase. The roads are, even now, primarily motor highways, and must become more and more such as time passes. Any investigation into the causes of motor accidents and the precautions and restrictions that should be imposed to ensure the safety of all sections of the community, would naturally prompt the question; which classes of road users suffer most from accidents. The answer is provided by an analysis of road accidents during 1933, based on figures provided by the Leicester Royal Infirmary, and published by the Medical Press and Circular. This journal, commenting on the analysis, says; The analysis confirms that those who suffer most are pedestrians. But what most people will be surprised to see is thqt motor-cyclists and their passengers are nearly as frequently injured as pedestrians, and that the motorcycle is proved to be more injurious to its rider than it is to other occupants of the road, though the number of pedestrians injured by motor-cyclists is a considerable one.

The pedal-cyclist evidently leads a dangerous life, and his chief enemy is not the motor-cyclists, but other motor vehicles. The most serious side of road accidents is the protracted period of •recovery which many of them involve. Following are the principal Leicester statistics concerning injured patients, with the vehicle involved in parentheses : Days in HosTotal. pital. Pedestrians (motor vehicles) 234 1,079 Pedestrians (motor-cycles) .. 65 786 Pedal-cyclists (motor vehicles) 160 997 Pedal-cyclists (motor-cycles) 21 176 Motorists and passengers .. 147 665 Motor-cyclists and passengers 244 1,796 In his message to the motorists of the Dominion, the Minister of Transport (Mr Coates) makes an appeal to all users of motor vehicles to appreciate the desirability of ensuring that the roads and streets of New Zealand be made safer for all. “Your co-oper-ation and suggestions are invited,” adds the Minister. It is generally admitted that in many circumstances speed is only a relative accident factor, and whether it is responsible for the modern toll of the road must be left to the judgment of experts. Suffice it to say, however, that sucli an authority as The Medical Press of England says that two million victims have been sacrificed since the w.ar on the, roads of Great Britain. The paper moreover asks: “What is the economic wastage alone?” In answer The Medical Press quotes figures contributed by Francis W. Hirst to “The Pace That Kills” (a study of road accidents by Mr T. C. Foley), which show “a total annual loss to the nation of £20,000,000, apart from the cost of policing the roads and streets.” Obviously it is to everybody’s interest to respond to the appeal issued by the Ministry of Transport, and not to declare that the proposals are “impossible,” but to help the controlling authorities to make practical and satisfactory what are experimental measures. JOBS FOR SOMEONE? It is regrettable that representatives of rural interests and the spokesmen of the manufacturers, should find themselves engaged in a verbal battle which can end only in futility. It ought to be abundantly clear to all intelligent citizens that the future of New Zealand reposes in the evolution of a more evenly balanced economic equilibrium which will pro-

vide for the development of both primary and secondary industries. Our primary industries are essential because the financial stability of the country depends upon the sale of produce to countries where the Dominion has national debt obligations to meet. The development of secondary industries is also imperative; indeed, it remained for the Unemployment Board to report in 1932 that “it is abundantly clear that the fuller development of existing secondary industries and the building up of new industries must be effected if unemployment figures are to become normal even after an improvement in export trade has occurred.” Just what the development of existing industries would mean to New’ Zealand is set out in the following statement recently issued by the New Zealand Manufacturers’ Federation: During the last few years the number of industrial workers has declined from 66,000 to 52,000 —with, of course, a corresponding decrease in the number of those indirectly dependent on manufacturing industry. The 14,000 displaced workers were actually in employment two or three years ago, so the necessary plant and equipment must be in existence to re-employ them. Only the market is required, and they could be reabsorbed in a month.

A calculation has been made by the New Zealand Manufacturers’ Federatidn on the basis of an inquiry into the difference between the “present, output” and “capacity output” of our existing factory plant. At a conservative estimate, at least 20,000 more workers could be directly employed with our existing plant—which means 40,000 directly and indirectly—if we were enabled to produce to full capacity. With additional plant, our existing factories could absorb, at a conservative estimate, 30,000 more workers than at present—which means that fresh employment would be found, directly and indirectly, for 60,000. This does not take new industries into account at all.

Without iu any way deprecating the claim of rural industries to he regarded as the backbone of the country’s prosperity, it can be admitted, as the Governor-General has been pleased to say, that “it is true patriotism and the height of prudence to support local industries by purchasing their products.” And the proposition boils itself down to the irrefutable conclusion that whenever we buy goods, any goods, we are giving employment to someone. The question then resolves itself into a demand for an answer as to whether we shall give the job to someone in New Zealand or if to someone outside the Dominion, to someone in some foreign country!