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Richmond Park crash (via Twitter Royal Parks Police)Police no longer describing road collisions as ‘accidents’ – but over two-thirds still refer to vehicles instead of drivers, new research finds
When was the last time you noticed a Ford Fiesta behaving suspiciously?
According to new analysis of public communications issued by the UK’s police forces, the vast majority of collision news reports still refer to vehicles instead of the person behind the wheel, with almost a quarter referring to the vehicle as an active participant in a crash.
This example of “absent driver” language, road safety campaigners say, shifts the public’s attention towards those injured in a crash and impacts perceptions of road danger.
Nevertheless, the research also found that the use of the term ‘accident’ to describe a road collision has been almost phased out entirely from police public communications in the UK, while an increasing number of police forces are adding additional context to their news releases, allowing audiences to understand crashes are not isolated incidents.
Conducted by journalists road.cc contributor Laura Laker, the author of the UK’s Road Collision Reporting Guidelines, and funded by the Foundation for Integrated Transport, the research analysed 227 press releases from 45 police forces across England, Wales and Northern Ireland, along with utilising Freedom of Information requests.
> “Language matters” – Road collision reporting guidelines launched
Launched in 2021, the Road Collision Reporting Guidelines, coordinated by Laker alongside the Active Travel Academy at the University of Westminster, encourage media and police to avoid using the word ‘accident’ until the facts of the collision are known – noting that ‘crash’ or ‘collision’ leave the question of who or what is to blame open – and to acknowledge the role of motorists in crashes.
At the time of the guidelines’ launch, Professor Rachel Aldred, the director of the Active Travel Academy, noted that “language matters, as it helps shape how we see and treat others”.
The new analysis carried out this month found that the use of ‘accident’ is now the exception in police news reports, rather than the rule, appearing just eight times across the 227 press releases, generally as apparent “slips of the tongue” in quotes from officers.
However, 70 per cent of the reports still referred to vehicles as participants in crashes, while 22 per cent described vehicles as ‘acting’ in those collisions, with no mention of a driver as an active participant.
The most extreme example of this “absent driver” language – a typical variation of which would feature “a collision involving a cyclist and a Mercedes” – included police news reports detailing vehicles “attempting to drive the wrong way”, “intentionally swerving”, or even “acting suspiciously”.
According to Laker, characterising the vehicles involved in collisions as such – instead of focusing on the driver – instead focuses audience attention, and therefore blame, towards those injured in a collision, by as much as 30 per cent.
Simply adding the terms ‘being driven’ or ‘driver’ to a sentence can create a more balanced public understanding of collisions, Laker notes.
Meanwhile, 49 of the 227 press releases included wider collision statistics relating to a sentencing outcome or police operation, helping readers understand that collisions are not isolated incidents, but part of predictable and preventable trends that contribute to road danger, such as speeding, distracted driving, and drink and drug driving.
Grouping the press releases into four categories (collision news, sentencing news, operations and initiatives, and tributes), the analysis found that collision news reports tended to feature the most ‘active vehicle’ language, and lacked context on wider collision trends.
A Freedom of Information Request also revealed that, since their launch over three years ago, only five forces (Greater Manchester, Gwent, Northamptonshire, South Yorkshire, and Warwickshire) have formally adopted the Road Collision Reporting Guidelines, and just one of them is using them in practice, prompting Laker to issue a new handbook to help continue to improve and provide more balance to the police’s use of language in the UK.
“Media descriptions of road collisions, particularly those involving pedestrians or cyclists, tend to be unbalanced, describing a victim first, and the person behind the wheel of a vehicle later, and sometimes not at all,” Laker said in a statement.
“Pedestrian casualties are depicted as isolated tragedies, cycling casualties as typical, while erasing the presence of drivers in collisions. News outlets commonly copy their use of language from police press releases verbatim.
“In more than a year working on this project I’ve met with blue light service staff committed to best practice, as well as services who still have further to go. Our emergency services are under a number of pressures and I’m grateful to all who engaged with me.
“It is encouraging to see an almost total absence of the word ‘accident’ in their communications – apart from what appear to be slips of the tongue when officers provide quotes – but this research shows there is room for improvement.
“When describing the mechanics of collisions police can dramatically improve balance by simply mentioning a driver, rather than just their vehicle, early on in the story, and the wider collision trends that impact communities.
“Crashes are not accidental, random, or isolated – they concern people, infrastructure, and systems, which can change. It’s great to see the language professionals use start to reflect this, and I hope the new reports help make even greater strides toward a shared goal of shifting thinking around road collisions.”
The National Police Chiefs Council’s (NPCC) roads policing lead, Jo Shiner, also praised forces for improving their use of language concerning road collisions, but noted there is room for improvement.
“I am incredibly supportive of these Road Collision Reporting Guidelines because we know how important using the right language at the right time is, not just for accurate reporting, but also of course, for victims, families, friends and communities,” Shiner said.
“A key pillar in the NPCC Roads Policing Strategy is about ‘Changing Minds’. Language matters if we are to change minds and inform the public of the truly devastating consequences death and injury has on our roads every day.
“It is also important to ensure anyone with information that can help a police investigation can come forward with confidence and therefore how we describe a collision, and all of the elements involved in it, is vital to securing that public support.”
After obtaining a PhD, lecturing, and hosting a history podcast at Queen’s University Belfast, Ryan joined road.cc in December 2021 and since then has kept the site’s readers and listeners informed and enthralled (well at least occasionally) on news, the live blog, and the road.cc Podcast. After boarding a wrong bus at the world championships and ruining a good pair of jeans at the cyclocross, he now serves as road.cc’s senior news writer. Before his foray into cycling journalism, he wallowed in the equally pitiless world of academia, where he wrote a book about Victorian politics and droned on about cycling and bikes to classes of bored students (while taking every chance he could get to talk about cycling in print or on the radio). He can be found riding his bike very slowly around the narrow, scenic country lanes of Co. Down.
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21 comments
I'll always remember where I was when the twin towers were involved in an air traffic accident..
We also need to shift people away from 'Right of way' and towards 'priority'.
The former is a thing, but not what people think it is.
The difference is a bit subtle, but getting people to understand it may just make a difference to their attitude towards road safety
I think that ship has sailed and I wouldn't choose that hill to die on, though I always use "priority" myself when discussing traffic. Another subtle point is that "priority" should only ever be given to other people/traffic and never be possessed by yourself (i.e. someone can give priority to traffic going straight on but you can't "take" priority by going straight on)
That's precisely the point that people fail to understand - even a green traffic light does confer any right to proceed regardless.
Sometimes you need to call the ship back to port.
Apathy solves nothing
I'm not advocating apathy, but I think effort would be better spent in trying to stop news outlets from de-personalising collisions (i.e. referring to "car hit something" rather than "driver hits something with their car"). There's also the important point of using something like "crash" or "collision" instead of "accident" although that does seem to be recognised more these days, so could be a battle won.
It's in the land of the sidewalk, for better or worse, that driving 'right of way' does exist. . . and many other things they can keep as well!
As I said, it does exist, but it doesn't mean what people think it does.
Right of way merely refers to the legal right to use a "way" - footway, Bridleway, highway or motorway, for example. What it doesn't refer to is some inalienable right to proceed, regardless of any other considerations.
"Priority" is the concept that people are usually alluding to, but that also doesn't allow anybody to proceed without ensuring that it's safe to do so - it merely defined who is expected to yield to who.
Even a green traffic light doesn't mean "off you go, full steam ahead"
Well done Laura, and best of luck on further progress.
And my Vauxhall Insignia ( for which I pay road tax, despite being a cyclist) looks very shifty. I think it is because of the shape of the headlights and the scowling radiator grille.
Just imagine how much more the car in the Richmond Park picture would have been damaged, if it hadn't stuck to the strict speed limit.
There's one that's always lurking outside our house at night.
Same here - they maybe working together.
Probably a friend of Herbie, or Christine.
I must admit I find it odd. I assumed a cyclist had run into a bus driver, fallen off and as a consequence, died (as in "run over by a bus driver"). But no, a bus driver had steered their vehicle left and run over a cyclist. Still, if the bus had been stolen by a child, it would be logical to say "he was run over by a child" - if not very informative? And a vehicle in a dodgy state of repair would certainly be behaving oddy, even if the driver was driving "brilliantly". So good to see "collision", tho. So
The oddness probably comes from the term "run over" which isn't particularly accurate. Using something like "driven into" or "driver and cyclist collision" is usually clearer, so your example would be "child drives stolen bus into ..."
It does seem reasonable to think that if you say a car hit someone, then you can assume it was being driven by a driver, and it shouldn't need to be spelled out. Meanwhile the phrase "a driver hit someone" can take a minute to process, and requires a few precious extra words to include the type of vehicle they were driving at the time, but I think it's something writers and readers will get the hang of.
There's probably also something about the possibility of a court case that encourages journalists to use more neutral and passive language, but inevitably if the main report of an incident is the initial coverage, then that's what sets the tone.
When it comes to murder, there is a push for the victims to get more focus in news stories than the murderer, especially if it's a serial killer. This can cause a bit of confusion when you aren't sure whether the photo that goes with the headline is of the victim or perpetrator of an incident.
I'd say the end of the routine use of 'accident' is the most valuable change to push for, and I'm pleased to see it finally taking root. But like 'right of way', it's very easy for those who do know better to revert to using the wrong language when you aren't thinking about it, but that's no excuse for professional journalists to get it wrong in written accounts.
It's interesting to compare the reporting of knife crime with RTCs. Imagine if the news ran headlines of "a pedestrian and a machete were involved in a street incident".
When you put it like that ...
I do have some sympathy for journalists as some members of the public get very angry at them for saying things like 'alleged murder' prior to the trial to avoid contempt of court etc. I think that mentality hangs-over into all of their reporting, but there are clearly ways in which reporting could be improved and readers would soon get used to it.
Yes, it does seem reasonable - but not in the motonormativity world, where people just don't want to admit where the problem lies.