The claim made by Professor Ian Roberts in the August issue of the Royal Society of Medicine Journal suggesting that the FIA Foundation is part of an attempted “corporate capture” of road safety by the motor industry is totally false and absurd.
The FIA Foundation, a UK registered charity, has no relationship with auto manufacturers whatsoever. It is entirely independent of industry and plays a leading role in promoting higher motor vehicle safety and environmental standards worldwide.
The Foundation, for example, supports the work of the award winning independent EuroNCAP consumer crash tests, the only such programme in the world that includes pedestrian protection rating. We are also leading a major campaign in support of the worldwide mandatory fitment in all new motor vehicles of the life saving crash avoidance system Electronic Stability Control (ESC). These are major challenges for the automobile industry.
Professor Roberts makes the outrageous suggestion that the Foundation does “not intend to fund road safety efforts themselves but will dictate how other organisations spend their money” this is entirely false. The Foundation has funded a wide range of road safety activities including the World Bank Global Road Safety Facility, the WHO World Report on Road Traffic Injury Prevention, the 2004 World Health Day, the UN Road Safety Collaboration and the 2007 UN Global Road Safety Week. At no time have we sought to direct the work of these organisations in any way that is against the interests of vulnerable road users or in support of any corporate interest whatsoever.
Professor Roberts was informed of these facts in May in response to his earlier suggestions of so called corporate capture but chose to ignore them in his latest article. The Foundation Director General David Ward has written to Editor of the Journal, Dr Kamran Abbasi demanding a right of reply: “Although Professor Roberts is perfectly entitled to his point of view about the risks of so called corporate capture of road safety he is quite wrong to claim that the FIA Foundation has any such agenda or commercial interests. To repeat these assertions in public through your journal when he has been informed of the facts is outrageous and I believe misleading to both you and your readers”.
Professor Roberts’ article contains numerous errors and false assertions. For example, claims that road safety education is the Foundation’s “favourite policy”. This is false. We strongly support an approach recognising that injury reduction depends on the combination of safer motor vehicles, better road design and behavioural change. Education and awareness campaigns have a role to play but only in conjunction with vehicle and road engineering and police enforcement.
Professor Roberts also claims that the Federation International de l’Automobile (FIA) set up the Commission for Global Road Safety and is funding amongst others the World Health Organisation. This is also wrong. The FIA is the non profit association of motoring organisations and the governing body of international motor sport. The FIA helped to create the FIA Foundation through a $300 million donation in 2001 (generated from the sale of its interest in F1 broadcasting rights) but we are now established as an independent UK registered charity. The Foundation set up the Commission for Global Road Safety under the Chairmanship of Lord Robertson of Port Ellen and not the FIA or Formula One.
Professor Roberts also makes inaccurate claims about the membership of the Commission for Global Road Safety suggesting that it is dominated by car industry interests. This is also false. The Commission has 12 members coming from G8 countries, Costa Rica, Kenya, India and Oman. They include a leading economist a medical professor, a Minister of transport, a head of road traffic police, a UN diplomat a former world champion, a public health expert in a road safety NGO, a former CEO of tyre company and just one representative of a motor vehicle manufacturer. It is true that three members have links to their national auto clubs.
Click here for further information on the Commission for Global Road Safety >
For the FIA Foundation’s full response to the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine report, click here (pdf) >