Safety road-show launched to help young drivers lower insurance costs

Students in Ireland have been taught about the shocking statistics that reveal a huge percentage of people killed on the country’s roads in road accidents every year, are young people.

One county council has even arranged a road show to be held to highlight the dangers to road users and young people on Irelands’ highways.

At the exhibition, secondary school pupils from South Dublin were informed that 279 people lost their lives on Irish roads during 2008 and of those that were killed, 42 per cent were under the age of 25 years old.

The survey that discovered these statistics also showed that over a third (35 per cent) of young people aged between 18 years old and 24 years old had been involved in a road collision. This is in stark comparison to the rest of the country aged over 25 years of age, as just 13 per cent had been involved in a car accident.

Further figures exposed during the study showed that as many as 53 per cent of young Irish people aged between 18 years old and 24 years old have personally known someone who has been involved in a road accident. This again contrasts with the figures for the rest of the population, with just 27 per cent of people over the age of 25 years old admitting to knowing someone who has been caught up in a traffic collision.

The road show is targeted at teenagers who are coming up to the age of driving and shows a dramatic and graphic account of how a night out can end in tragedy. The story is told as the events unfold by a spokesperson from the emergency services, an Accident and Emergency consultant and the mother of a girl who was killed in a car crash.

An insurance expert said, “Insurance groups in Europe are dealing with hundreds of claims every week as a result of traffic collisions. The effects are well documented; too many people are being killed on our roads. We hope that young people will learn from this event, think twice about the seriousness of safety when driving and realise the consequences of taking risks on the road.”

Inexperienced drivers are 10 times more likely to be involved in car accidents on Irelands’ roads, which have resulted in young driver car insurance being one of the most expensive premiums on the market.