Kerre Woodham: The road toll still needs reducing

Kerre Woodham: The road toll still needs reducing

From Kerre Woodham Mornings Podcast by Newstalk ZB

April 30, 2026 · 6 min

About this episode

Kerre Woodham discusses the ongoing issue of road tolls in New Zealand and the historical context of road safety improvements.

You'll have heard it in our news, since Monday the 20th of April, 18 people have been killed in 14 separate crashes on our roads. As of this morning, 12 more lives have been lost on New Zealand roads so far this year compared to the same point last year. To give some context though, our road tolls today are nothing like the bad old days. Back in 1973, long before many of you were born, when we had a much smaller population and fewer cars on the road, the road toll was around 850 deaths. And you can only imagine the injuries involved in those as well. In 1975 seatbelts in cars became compulsory and the road toll began to decline. It was around about 625 in 1975 – that was considered cause for celebration. And over time, it's come down to fewer than 300 deaths on the road thanks to seatbelts, thanks to better engineering of cars, thanks to improved medical outcomes and rigorous enforcement of traffic rules.   But the fact that things are better than they used to be will be cold comfort to the families of those killed, to the first responders and to the poor bloody truckies who are travelling along the highway, minding their own business, doing the speed limit, big heavy load…

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