Evidence fails to show need for change
ASKED a straightforward question by a member of the public, the States responded in time-honoured fashion and ducked the issue.
The request for access to public information was about speed limits, but it could have been just about anything.
Environment & Infrastructure rummaged through the States’ list of excuses and seized upon a favourite, exemption 2.4, which shields internal discussion and policy advice from disclosure.
Since almost anything a committee deals with can be said to be ‘internal discussion’ it is a catch-all excuse for government to draw the blinds.
The same exemption was used this week by Education, Sport & Culture to block a request for information about predicted grades for each of the States secondary schools for 2018.
However, the speed limit request to E&I came with a clever caveat from someone used to the States’ lack of transparency: ‘if the request [for information] is refused, a copy of the raw data collected by staff used to inform their report to the committee’.
That one was harder to refuse and E&I duly listed 13 pieces of primary data.
None came with explanatory notes and it was therefore difficult to see how it formed the bedrock of evidence for a move to 80-plus new 25mph zones.
If anything, much of the data indicated the opposite: low numbers of serious accidents; more complaints about the lack of road mirrors than speeding; accidents spread across the island rather than in the main centres; and the top six accident blackspots are all in existing 25mph zones.
Furthermore, a speed limit summary revealed that island motorists are a commendably cautious bunch. For in 35mph zones across the island drivers are averaging less than the speed limit, in some cases driving at anything up to 12mph under.
Where the problems lie, intriguingly, is in 20 and 25mph zones. Here the picture is very different with drivers often breaking the limit.
The message is that Guernsey drivers are not, on the whole, obsessed by speed. They do, however, struggle to hold themselves to 20-25mph.
If the new limits are implemented, the signs are that many drivers will continue to drive at the speed they consider sensible, regardless of limits.
Only this time, many will be doing so illegally.