Local government and road safety.

Road trauma is one of the major public health problems facing this country. Last year 1,509 people died on our roads. The Bureau of Infrastructure Transport and Regional Economics (BITRE) report on the Cost of Road Crashes in Australia 2006 [1] estimates that road crashes cost the community nearly $18 billion in 2006, equivalent to 1.7 per cent of GDP. There were an estimated 653 853 road crashes in 2006 involving 1.16 million vehicles resulting in the loss of 1602 lives. These are shocking statistics, but what they do not reflect is the personal pain and injury experienced by the people directly involved and their families and friends.