Campaign against texting and driving

Last Year's Campaign:
‘Don’t become a crash statistic'

A CAMPAIGN has been launched to attempt to reduce the number of young people involved in car accidents in Dorset.

Last year statistics showed that one in four people injured in car accidents in Dorset were under the age of 25. The current Campaign targets young people who write texts on their phones while driving.

Posters are being placed nationwide of a blood covered mobile phone with a half written text message on it. The message is ‘Texting And Driving Don’t Mix’ and is endorsed by the members of Dorset Road Safe, including Dorset Safety Camera Partnership, Dorset County Council, Borough of Poole and Bournemouth Borough Council.
Statistics from the RAC Foundation report created last year reveal from a survey of 2, 000 users of Facebook that 45% of UK drivers engage in texting whilst driving. Most of these people are young people.

The RAC Foundation study involved seventeen drivers (aged 17-24 years). Drivers completed one normal drive and one drive in which they were given text messaging
tasks. Reaction times were around 35% slower when writing a text message.

Last year there was a campaign entitled, ‘Don’t become a crash statistic,’ and featured the image of a body lying on a mortuary table with a label on its toe which had written on it, ‘UR BST M8’.

Chief Inspector Robert Nicols from the County Council Road Safety Team said:

“What I can say is that I think campaigns such as these will eventually make a difference as it will help a shift in social attitudes. I’m hopeful that campaigns like this help attitudes to change over time towards responsible driving.”


Credit: Photo was taken from the Bournemouth Echo website