We have been pushing it hard in Central Otago!

[dipshit]

No, he's simply trying to warn us assertions that cars cause most bike accidents are not supported by the data. It's a statement which appears daily on this forum but from my reading of MOT and ACC stats, its wrong.

There are two problems with making an ill-founded submission:

1. Your whole submission, which may otherwise contain excellent points, is tainted by one incorrect statement. Accordingly it will be of little influence.

2. Blaming car drivers for motorcycle accidents pits one group of road users against another. And who comprises the vast majority? And what group will most MPs fall into......? Basically its an argument which won't gain much sympathy.

Thank you. Precisely.

[StoneY]

Well done Monstaman and the WMC members

You guys rock
Keep up the GREAT work

[YellowDog]

No, he's simply trying to warn us assertions that cars cause most bike accidents are not supported by the data. It's a statement which appears daily on this forum but from my reading of MOT and ACC stats, its wrong.

There are two problems with making an ill-founded submission:

1. Your whole submission, which may otherwise contain excellent points, is tainted by one incorrect statement. Accordingly it will be of little influence.

2. Blaming car drivers for motorcycle accidents pits one group of road users against another. And who comprises the vast majority? And what group will most MPs fall into......? Basically its an argument which won't gain much sympathy.

Dipshit's destructive assertions serve no purpose other than annoy people trying to do a good job.

Whereas your own personal comments are constructive and may help others further this cause.

My own personal veiw of this problem is one of standards and eduction. Road usage in general is of a very low standard and in my opinion, this is contributing significantly towards the problem.

The government stance does nothing to address the problem and seems very happy with the number of deaths on the roads. It just wants more money to fund this acceptable situation.

My opinion is that the situation is unacceptable. If car drivers were stopped and fined for hogging the outside lane at a slow speed, then they would be less likely to do it. The same goes for not indicating 3 seconds before the manouevre and not stopping at stop signs etc. etc. etc.
(the same goes for bikers) There are a many examples, but the way to address the situation is by making it tougher to pass a test and get a licence. Just raise the bar and it will feed through. The fixation on 'Speed Kills' is ignorant and short sighted. It is driving or riding poorly that kills and it isn't the same thing. If you were to go to Germany and see the considerably higher general standard of driving, you would understand what I mean.

Now as for allowing an inexperienced motorcyclist to learn on a 250cc bike; get real! Surely it should be related to power and not cc?

IMO - No way should anyone be allowed to ride a 250cc bike solo after just a Basic Handling Test. It is just complete madness. Pass your test and then try and learn not to kill yourself; which is ineffect what happens. No offence to anyone on here and it is great that they ask however:

"Why do I get scared over 80kph"

"What is countersteering"

These are the sort of questions I observe with absolute horror. Surely proving proficiency should be over a period of time and require several tests. When I learnt to ride in the 1970s, the local authority ran a 10 week course. This was before taking a basic handling test and designed to reduce motorcycle road deaths.

The point of my post is to say that I don't believe that idiots we have in power really have a clue as to what the problem is or how to start addressing it.

I would suggest that understanding the problem should come first.

[NighthawkNZ:Me]

First off the simple fact is ACC aint broke nor is it broken and loosing money, last year it made a profit. It also has nothing to do with the number of claims being made... steady at $1.7 billion for the last 2 years

ACC is making enough money and was even able to put 1 billion into more investments. The ‘crisis’ is just modelling changes for a bookkeeping exercise that has no effect other than to make levies higher now so they won’t have to be as high later (apparently).

If they extend the deadline to be fully funded then no changes need to be made... The debt they are going on about is no where as bad as it they make it out to be But it’s basically just a book-keeping/cost-spreading exercise (most of ACC’s assets are actually government bonds, so the government (Treasury) owes itself (ACC) money).

Most NZer's don't care if ACC is a fully funded or pay as you go system... But they are feeling it in the pocket as we are making those savings in the bank to become fully funded.

[Ronin]

Seriously, I am utterly convinced your average motorcyclist is as thick as two planks.

What I am *NOT* doing is writing to my local newspaper going - "waaaaa, it's all the car drivers fault, waaaa."... and making all motorcyclists look like a bunch of fuckwits.

Please, with your limited intelligence - do not write a load of whingeing bullshit in which you have no idea what you are talking about to any form of media. You lot are more than likely doing more harm than good in the long run

And I fully realise most of you will be to thick to grasp this.

Sorry, we may have limited intelligence but grammar is still important.

Now, about that lack of hugs.

[gatch]

Firstly, good work and thankyou for drawing attention to the issue.

Secondly however I agree with some of the previous posts, blaming automobile pilots for majority of bike crashes is IMO not a fanastic idea, or boy racers (really they are fuck all..), pushing the carbon footprint aspect may be more effective, also questioning the use of flawed statistics that the government is basing their conclusions on, the number of single occupant cars on the road, the ridiculousness of paying $700 buck per bike if you own more than one bike etc.

But anyway, thanks again, I'll be riding to parliament hopefully next month.. Hopefully they will take notice aye.

[davereid]

What makes you think that most motorcycle accidents are caused by other motorists?

The reason these figures are very popular is as a result of the worlds two largest motorcycle safety studies, the HURT report, and the MAIDs report.

These reports were done to international standards, and the authors submitted the raw data for peer review. In the eyes of many, this makes the data more factual, than figures produced by our own authorities, who have a reputation for "making things up", and wont release the raw data for review.

The HURT and MAIDs reports found a very close correlation, even though they were decades apart, and on different continents.

Key findings :

75% of accidents were a collision between a car and a bike, and 66% of those accidents were caused by the car violating the right of way

In other words,
- 66% of car v bike is the car drivers fault
- At least 49.5% of all accidents were the fault of a car driver
- slightly under 3% of accidents were caused by vehicle defects
- 2% of accidents were caused by road defects
- 1% was caused by animals

Thats why.

[Winston001]

First off the simple fact is ACC aint broke nor is it broken and loosing money, last year it made a profit. It also has nothing to do with the number of claims being made... steady at $1.7 billion for the last 2 years

ACC is making enough money and was even able to put 1 billion into more investments. The ‘crisis’ is just modelling changes for a bookkeeping exercise that has no effect other than to make levies higher now so they won’t have to be as high later (apparently).

If they extend the deadline to be fully funded then no changes need to be made... The debt they are going on about is no where as bad as it they make it out to be But it’s basically just a book-keeping/cost-spreading exercise (most of ACC’s assets are actually government bonds, so the government (Treasury) owes itself (ACC) money).

Most NZer's don't care if ACC is a fully funded or pay as you go system... But they are feeling it in the pocket as we are making those savings in the bank to become fully funded.

Mmmmm.......but if the government of the day - and remember full funding was introduced by Labour - decides it is broke, then we have an uphill battle persuading MPs otherwise.

Plus fully funding ACC claims is sensible. The idea is to have enough in kitty to cover longterm payments for people who have permanent disabilities. The alternative is to raise levies each year and as we can see right now, that's a whole kettle of fish.

[NighthawkNZ:Me]

Mmmmm.......but if the government of the day - and remember full funding was introduced by Labour - decides it is broke, then we have an uphill battle persuading MPs otherwise.

Plus fully funding ACC claims is sensible. The idea is to have enough in kitty to cover longterm payments for people who have permanent disabilities. The alternative is to raise levies each year and as we can see right now, that's a whole kettle of fish.

I agree the idea of fully funding ACC is good, but the recession is biting the average pocket, if the extend the 2014 deadlind it will ease the pain.

1999 we start the transission to become fully funded (yes Labour) and we are nearly there but the recession also hit some of the investments which means the they didn't make as much return as predicted.

The Scheme’s claim liability (the future cost of existing claims) now stands at $23.8 billion – against current net assets (the money ACC has ‘in the bank’ to cover those future costs) of $11 billion.

Again at the end of the day ACC is not broke and or loosing money

[Winston001]

The reason these figures are very popular is as a result of the worlds two largest motorcycle safety studies, the HURT report, and the MAIDs report.

These reports were done to international standards, and the authors submitted the raw data for peer review. In the eyes of many, this makes the data more factual, than figures produced by our own authorities, who have a reputation for "making things up", and wont release the raw data for review.

The HURT and MAIDs reports found a very close correlation, even though they were decades apart, and on different continents.

Key findings :

75% of accidents were a collision between a car and a bike, and 66% of those accidents were caused by the car violating the right of way

In other words,
- 66% of car v bike is the car drivers fault
- At least 49.5% of all accidents were the fault of a car driver
- slightly under 3% of accidents were caused by vehicle defects
- 2% of accidents were caused by road defects
- 1% was caused by animals

Thats why.

Good stuff and the kind of data we need. I still think it'll be largely ignored because these studies didn't take place in NZ and the ACC and MOT data is going to be preferred.

Plus it requires bikers to blame car drivers.......

Plus it begs the obvious question - just remove motorcycles. They are clearly dangerous. Trust me, I've heard plenty of people say that lately......

[gatch]

I've heard plenty of people say that lately......

They need to be burned in public.

Alternatively tarred and feathered..

[NighthawkNZ:Me]

trust me, I've heard plenty of people say that lately......

Well you should have stayed on your bike... would have been easier on every one you know...

But we are human and humans make mistakes and have accidents

[Monstaman]

The reason these figures are very popular is as a result of the worlds two largest motorcycle safety studies, the HURT report, and the MAIDs report.

These reports were done to international standards, and the authors submitted the raw data for peer review. In the eyes of many, this makes the data more factual, than figures produced by our own authorities, who have a reputation for "making things up", and wont release the raw data for review.

The HURT and MAIDs reports found a very close correlation, even though they were decades apart, and on different continents.

Key findings :

75% of accidents were a collision between a car and a bike, and 66% of those accidents were caused by the car violating the right of way

In other words,
- 66% of car v bike is the car drivers fault
- At least 49.5% of all accidents were the fault of a car driver
- slightly under 3% of accidents were caused by vehicle defects
- 2% of accidents were caused by road defects
- 1% was caused by animals

Thats why.

Great info that is and hopefully they will take notice of those findings.

The other aspect is reducing the ACC liability to excluding injury while doing crime or in prison, non residents who are none tax payers, we are heading to China on Saturday and we have to cover for our on med insurance so why should we cover overseas people here in NZ.

Many arguments I suppose, hopefully it will be mediated into something normal and other sports within the system may find themselves paying a levy for the contact sports, i.e. snowboarding, skiing, mountain biking, rugby etc.

[dipshit]

Great info that is and hopefully they will take notice of those findings.

So you think the government will base policy off a study done in 1976 in the USA over our current NZ road statistics..???

[davereid]

Great info that is and hopefully they will take notice of those findings.

Sadly, these facts have been known for years... they just choose to make up their own data, and we are stuck with that.

However, any motorcyclist claiming that 2/3rds of collisions are the car drivers fault, can point at very good source data.

Which is way more than ACC can do.

P.S. I have the full HURT report as a PDF if required.