6: Stop the Killing without liability

Introduce a presumed civil liability law on behalf of vehicular traffic when they kill or seriously injure vulnerable road-users, where there is no evidence blaming the victim.

The legal system is failing to protect pedestrians and cyclists from dangerous drivers, provides inadequate redress after an incident and passes out overly lenient sentences when drivers are convicted [1].

Currently the law presumes the victim is always liable unless they can prove the motorist was guilty. This goes against natural justice and our British sense of fair play & means the motor insurance companies are escaping paying for the carnage caused and so profiting as a result.

‘Presumed liability’ rules should be introduced to compensate cyclists and pedestrians for road crash injuries, as is the case in many other European countries. This would stop the driver’s version of events being accepted whether or not there is evidence to support it, which is often the case in serious crashes where the victim loses conciousness.

Given the danger posed by motor traffic, and that the cyclists or pedestrian will almost always be the injured party, a system of presumed liability which puts the onus on the driver to prove fault is a fair reflection of the situation [2].

[1] http://www.theguardian.com/environment/bike-blog/2014/jun/12/how-can-the-justice-system-be-rebalanced-in-favour-of-cyclists

[2] http://www.ctc.org.uk/sites/default/files/file_public/compensationandliabilitybrf.pdf


 

Note:

Stop the Killing also believes that changes are needed to ensure proper investigation of road traffic incidents, with drivers held to account for putting others at risk [3] [4] and sentences which reflect the seriousness of the incident.

[3] http://www.roadjustice.org.uk/police-petition

[4] http://www.roadsafetygb.org.uk/news/1861.html

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