ROAD SAFETY

Wairarapa Times-Age, 9 June 1938, Page 7

ROAD SAFETY

EFFORTS OF TRANSPORT DEPARTMENT BIG INCREASE IN MOTOR MILEAGE. OBSERVATIONS BY MINISTER. “On the law of averages, during the past 19 months we have kept 100 persons out of their coffins,” declared the Hon. R. Semple, Minister of Transport, when referring in the Opera House last night to the efforts of the Transport Department to reduce the number of road fatalities.

New Zealand, he added, was the only country in the world that could show a 30 per cent increase in the number of motor cars and no increase in road fatalities. New Zealand was the second highest motorised country in the world and there was a motor-car for every five persons, men, women and children. America, where cars were half as cheap as in New Zealand, only narrowly headed us. The rapid increase in motor transport amply justifield the regrading, rebuilding and readjustment of our roading system. It was being done all over the world and would have to be done in this country. The day of the metalled road- was gone.

“Vast changes are taking place,” continued Mr Semple, “and while our roading system served its purpose in the past the coming of a new order has necessitated the building of a new system. I have been trying to save lives on the road and to institute an efficient road code and proper road control. I have been pursuing the drunken driver with the vengeance of a Bengal tiger. My efforts are of no value, however, if the roading system is at fault and represents a danger zone instead of a safety zone. It is the bounden duty of any Government that knows its job to provide a maximum of protection for its people. Our roading system will have to be made to measure up to modern demands. At present this country is building roads faster and cheaper than ever 5 before and at the same time paying the men a decent living wage.” Mr Semple went on to state that the Transport Department had kept in touch with developments in other parts of the world and was moving as fast at is could along the route of progress. It .was not intended that man should be the slave of the machine; the machine should be the slave of man, and the inventive genius of'the human race should be used for the benefit of the human race. Modern transport had brought the people of the world together and that in turn had made competition between the various countries much keener. Therefore it was essential that New Zealand should have the most modern methods of doing things. Mr Semple traced the growth of private motor transport from 1914 to the present record stage and said that the remarkable increase in the number of cars in recent years was a pretty good indication that the Government was not bankrupting the country.

After stating that the highways of the country were now a beehive of activity, Mr Semple said that when he took office rafferty rules prevailed. There were 330 different sets of bylaws in the country. He had wiped all those out and had established one simple set covering all roads from Auckland to the Bluff. The traffic laws had been tightened up and a Council of Road Safety appointed. Dealing with the Transport Co-Ordination Board which was in office when he assumed power, the Minister said he had to take full responsibility for their actions, although he had not the slightest control over them.

“The three wealthy old gentlemen on the board,” the Minister added, “received £3OOO a year between them. I compelled them to make a masterly exit to the rear. I am the Appeal Board now and it is the easiest job I have. It takes me about ten minutes a week to do the work those dear old gentlemen received £3OOO a year for. ... In place of 36 licensing authorities, I now have only four. It used to be perpetual wholesale slaughter on the roads and no one seemed to care. Our first duty was to put the reading system in order and we are doing that as fast as we possibly can.”