By Julie Armstrong

Last updated 11:40, Monday, 30 June 2008

ROAD deaths in Britain last year fell to the lowest level since national records began over 80 years ago – despite there being over 33 million cars on the road today, compared with just 1.7 million in 1926.

The number of people killed in 2007 fell seven per cent from the year before to 2,943 – 229 fewer fatalities. The number of children killed fell 28 per cent to 121.

Just one-and-a-half per cent of all injuries on Britain’s roads happened in Cumbria, where 45 people were killed and 2,418 people injured.

The Institute of Advanced Motorists (IAM) said the number of driving deaths being below 3,000 for the first time was a major success for road safety policy in Britain.

Neil Greig, director of the IAM Motoring Trust, said: “There is no place for complacency in road safety. But national targets and the concentration on the simple message of the three Es – of education, enforcement and engineering – have delivered safer roads than ever before.

“The challenge now is to drive down these figures even further by targeting known high risks such as rural, single carriageways, young drivers and those who drive for work. Further reductions in deaths on the road will not come cheap and government must allocate more funding to road engineering schemes and actively encourage drivers to treat driving as a skill for life.”

Pedestrian injuries were also down three per cent to 30,191 and the number killed dropped five per cent to 644.

But it was not all good news in the Department for Transport statistics released on Thursday.

Despite the overall fall in casualties, serious motorcycle casualties were up four per cent, to 6,149, and serious cyclist casualties jumped by six per cent.

The DfT report – Road Casualties in Great Britain 2007 – shows 2,428 people sustained severe injuries while cycling in 2007.

Of those, 509 were children aged 15 or under compared to 472 in 2006 – an eight per cent jump. Thirteen died.

There was a five per cent rise to 1,872 among adults seriously injured, while adult cycle fatalities also increased by six per cent to 122.

Kevin Clinton, head of road safety at the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents, said it was no good encouraging people to cycle without investing in cycle lanes to make cycling safer.

He said: “There is a lot of money going into encouraging cycling. But if you have more people using bicycles, will you have more people injured using them? We need investment to make sure that won’t happen. If people think cycling is dangerous, they are not going to get on their bikes.”

Andrew Howard, head of road safety at the AA, said cyclists themselves were partly to blame for ignoring the Highway Code by riding through red lights. He suggested teenagers performing stunts on BMX-style bikes while showing off to friends have also inflated the figures.

The RAC suggested drivers were also to blame for failing to take proper account of vulnerable road users. Its research found that almost half – 48 per cent – admit erupting in rage and shouting at cyclists or pedestrians who get in their way and 44 per cent are confused by their actions and signals.

Sheila Rainger, deputy director of the RAC Foundation, said: “To measure falls in road deaths in hundreds rather than tens is wonderful news and a great achievement for everyone working towards safer roads.

“But there is no room for complacency. Continuing the work to develop positive driver attitudes, particularly among young and novice drivers, encouraging better communication between road users, supporting high-profile enforcement by traffic police and implementing engineering improvements at known accident hotspots will help to sustain this improvement.”

JArmstrong@cngroup.co.uk