Lawford Kidd's Blog

Reported road accident and casualty statistics have been released by Transport Scotland’s Statistician.

The statistics show that there were:

• 186 deaths on Scotland's roads in 2011 - 11% fewer than in 2010 (208), 47% fewer than 2001 (348) and the lowest figure since records began;
• 1,875 reported seriously injured in 2011 - 5% fewer than in 2010 (1,968), 45% fewer than 2001 (3,410) and the lowest number since records began;
• 12,770 reported casualties in total in 2011 - 4% fewer than in 2010 (13,338) and a 36% reduction on 2001 (19,911);
• 1,315 child casualties, 5% fewer than in 2010 (1,378) and 55% fewer than 2001 (2,923); and
• seven child fatalities in 2011, three more than 2010 and an average of five over the last three years.

With regards to road accidents, there were:

The Court of Appeal in England this week amended a ruling that would have led to an increase in general damages in most civil cases from 1st April 2013.

The general background to the case is the balanced package of measures recommended in the final report of the Review of Civil Litigation Costs produced by Lord Justice Jackson in January 2010, and due to be implemented in large part in April 2013.

Many of the Review’s recommendations have been enacted by Parliament in the Legal Aid Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012.

Shops, offices, pubs and clubs will no longer face health and safety inspections, and over 3,000 regulations will be scrapped or overhauled in a radical plan by the Government to curb red tape and boost British business growth.

From April 2013, the Government intends to introduce binding new rules on both the Health & Safety Executive and on local authorities, that will exempt hundreds of thousands of businesses from regular health & safety inspections.

In future, businesses will only face health and safety inspections if they are operating in higher risk areas such as construction, or if they have an incident or a track record of poor performance.