Car Safety Technology Saves Lives But Can Put Up Insurance Costs
Friday, 6. April 2018
It must be 25 years ago, soon after I took delivery of my brand new BMW 5 Series, when driving home with the family on board I had to slow fairly rapidly for some traffic lights. To be honest the sun was low and very bright and I was momentarily blinded.
As I stopped I glanced in the rear view mirror and noticed a van speeding up behind me, clearly blinded like me. I shouted to my two young sons in the back to sit back, which they did, whilst I dabbed the brake pedal which caught the eye of the van driver it was too late to prevent an accident. I saw the van behind crumple.
When I got out of the car, after checking the family, although I knew they were fine as we didn’t feel a thing, I was shocked to see that the back of my car looked as though it had been nudged by a push bike whilst the van must have been close to being written off. My car was perfectly driveable and I booked it in for the damage to be assessed.
The other party, the local authority, agreed to pay for the damage so I wasn’t worried but I was shocked to learn that it was going to cost nearly £1,000, bear in mind this was 25 years ago. You see it wasn’t the bumper that needed replacing it was the gubbins behind, like a train buffer and, as with an air bag, once it’s deployed it must be replaced.
Again bearing in mind that this was 25 years ago, you can imagine that if the same happened today I would not only be as protected as I was then but the rear end would have embedded in it parking sensors, a camera and a raft of other safety equipment that would prevent injury but cost a fortune to repair.
Deaths on our roads dropped by 44% between 2006 and 2016, from 3,172 to 1,792. The fact is that whilst lives are being saved as a result of everything from seat belts and air bags to stability control (ESP) and automatic emergency braking (AEB) when an accident happens and you walk away from it the cost of repair and replacement is getting astronomical.
A price worth paying in my opinion. By Graham Hill
