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Katie Woolf spoke with NT Traffic Police Senior Sergeant Paul Faustman · 360 with Katie Woolf

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Northern Territory Traffic Police Senior Sergeant Paul Foustman. Great to
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: have you in the studio. I always struggle with your
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: surname for some reason, but I'll get there.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, I noticed that you are improving, Fausty.
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  Speaker 1: There's plenty going on at the moment now with this weather, obviously,
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  Speaker 1: it means that it's a timely reminder to just slide
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  Speaker 1: down a little bit and make sure you've got your
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  Speaker 1: lights on.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, the wet weather is upon us, as we spoke
• 0:26
  Speaker 2: about in previous weeks, and obviously there's some testing times
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  Speaker 2: when you're driving vehicles in the rain, especially when we're
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  Speaker 2: early in the morning and late in the afternoon. We're
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  Speaker 2: on our way to work or on our way home
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  Speaker 2: from work, so we know that we should be having
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  Speaker 2: our headlights on and make sure our cars are road worthy,
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  Speaker 2: tires are good, and just be a little bit more,
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  Speaker 2: take a little bit more time and make sure that
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  Speaker 2: your hang back distance is a little bit expanded to
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  Speaker 2: the four second rule comes into play there, and daveryone
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  Speaker 2: should be safe on our roads by doing so.
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  Speaker 1: Well, and let's hope that everybody actual does that. Now.
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  Speaker 1: I know that there's been a little bit of research
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  Speaker 1: conducted recently about seat belt wearing. What have I found?
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  Speaker 2: Yes, there has been some research CADI. As you know,
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  Speaker 2: the road Safety has shared responsibility on the roads of
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  Speaker 2: the Northern Territory and the Northern Territory Police work closely
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  Speaker 2: with other agencies, both government and non government agencies. In
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  Speaker 2: early twenty twenty, the Motor Accident Compensation Commission commissioned a
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  Speaker 2: campaign to evaluate the always Wear your seat belt road
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  Speaker 2: safety campaign. Now, your listeners out there may remember this
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  Speaker 2: one or no, this one with the peace sign that's
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  Speaker 2: back to front on an angle. One of the parts
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  Speaker 2: that sticks out for me is the young child in
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  Speaker 2: the back seat of the car that's actually identifying to
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  Speaker 2: mumum putting my seatbelt on. And that's a great thing.
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  Speaker 2: And so by the actual movement of the hand and
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  Speaker 2: the figure, the football players on the field doing it,
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  Speaker 2: what have you. We're trying to get that message across.
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  Speaker 2: And so that's have been brought out relation to the
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  Speaker 2: success of the actual campaign and actually has been quite successful.
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  Speaker 2: But there's some interesting results that have actually come out
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  Speaker 2: of it. The survey that they did, they surveyed about
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  Speaker 2: four hundred people and they were of a nice varying
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  Speaker 2: age group, and they managed to get a fifty to
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  Speaker 2: fifty split between male and female. And it actually states
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  Speaker 2: some of the results state that over the last ten years,
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  Speaker 2: when the four hundred and thirty people that have died
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  Speaker 2: on territory roads are four hundred and thirty ten years
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  Speaker 2: territories that still we would love them to still be
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  Speaker 2: here who have died on our roads, thirty three percent
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  Speaker 2: or one hundred and forty three of those were not
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  Speaker 2: wearing a seat belt at the time of their demise. Now,
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  Speaker 2: obviously that's when you hear it in figures like that,
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  Speaker 2: it's shocking, it's confronting. And going further on, ninety nine
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  Speaker 2: percent of the respondents that seat belts are important, that
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  Speaker 2: they save lives. However, almost half of the respondents forty
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  Speaker 2: six percent, had driven or been a passenger in a
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  Speaker 2: car without a seat belt on recently.
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  Speaker 1: It's quite unbelievable.
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  Speaker 2: I'm sitting here shaking my head and I see you're
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  Speaker 2: shaking your head too, And in the past month, fourteen
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  Speaker 2: percent of the respondents hadn't worn a seat belt.
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  Speaker 1: It's the first thing I do when I get in
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  Speaker 1: a car, is I put the seat belt on. I'm
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  Speaker 1: really actually quite surprised that not everybody does that.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's one of those things that you close the
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  Speaker 2: door and as you close the door, you reach across
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  Speaker 2: and you grab your seat belt, and if you put
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  Speaker 2: the car in motion, you you should have developed a
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  Speaker 2: feeling within yourself that something is missing, something is wrong,
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  Speaker 2: and you need to address it. You need to put
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  Speaker 2: the seat belt on. So you know, they've been around
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  Speaker 2: since nineteen seventy one and people still fail to wear
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  Speaker 2: seat belts. And you know, I'll go on further to
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  Speaker 2: state that the most common reason for people not wearing
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  Speaker 2: seat belts is that the driving a short distance. Now,
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  Speaker 2: as a police officer, many officers out there will attest
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  Speaker 2: to this that that is a common response. I'm just
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  Speaker 2: going around the corner. Commonplace for it is industrial areas,
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  Speaker 2: the tradees who are all running around, moving around really
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  Speaker 2: quickly picking up bits and pieces to build houses, fixed
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  Speaker 2: cars or whatever they do, and they file to put
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  Speaker 2: the seabot on and they risk a five hundred dollar fine.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, well, this is the thing. You know, you're lucky
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  Speaker 1: if you just get a five hundred dollar fine, Like
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  Speaker 1: at the end of the day, you can lose your life,
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  Speaker 1: and that's the important part here.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah. Absolutely, and then we speak about the risk associated
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  Speaker 2: with that, and people were in our environment now we
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  Speaker 2: risk is something that all agencies and government agencies speak
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  Speaker 2: about the risk and they're obviously taking that risk one
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  Speaker 2: that they won't get caught and two that they don't
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  Speaker 2: perceive that there's going to be a potential of them
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  Speaker 2: being involved in those serious car accident. Unfortunately, it's generally
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  Speaker 2: males really more likely to take the risk of driving
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  Speaker 2: without a seat belt.
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  Speaker 1: Well, and you mentioned then that obviously the laws around
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  Speaker 1: wearing a seat belt came into effect in nineteen seventy one.
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  Speaker 1: Is it people that are maybe a little bit older
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  Speaker 1: that were used to driving without their seat belts.
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  Speaker 2: You'd suspect that to be the case, Katie, but unfortunately
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  Speaker 2: it's not the majority of people that are that are
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  Speaker 2: not wearing seat belts of age between twenty one and
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  Speaker 2: twenty eight years of age.
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  Speaker 1: I mean that Look that bothers me because I think
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  Speaker 1: it's young people. You sort of think your bulletproof, you
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  Speaker 1: think that it won't happen to you, but that's just
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  Speaker 1: not the case.
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  Speaker 2: Yes, So I didn't want to be the bearer of
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  Speaker 2: bad news. But obviously it's a timely reminder to all
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  Speaker 2: our drivers out there and our listeners to really drive
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  Speaker 2: home that you need to wear seat belts while you
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  Speaker 2: drive your car. It is one of the major factors
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  Speaker 2: of fatal and serious crashes on our road. So far
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  Speaker 2: to date this year, we're tracking well as far as
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  Speaker 2: no one really wants to say, you're tracking. Well. We've
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  Speaker 2: lost twenty people on our roads this year, and that's
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  Speaker 2: that's really sad. Last year we were at twenty three.
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  Speaker 2: We just got to keep moving towards zero. We've got
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  Speaker 2: to keep working towards that and where your seat belt
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  Speaker 2: and help us drive that.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, I agree, well, and I mean even over the
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  Speaker 1: course of the weekend, we know, we've spoken to Saint
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  Speaker 1: John Paramedics and they'd said that there were seven crashes
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  Speaker 1: on the weekend with seven people that had to be
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  Speaker 1: transported to hospital. You know, so those serious crashes happen
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  Speaker 1: a lot more I reckon than what people realize. And
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  Speaker 1: it just goes to show you again why it's so
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  Speaker 1: important to follow those road rules.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, and I think people are probably becoming a little
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  Speaker 2: bit desensitized to the fact that crashes do occur. We
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  Speaker 2: see them quite regularly, and people just it becomes the
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  Speaker 2: normal the of their life. Well, we don't want it
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  Speaker 2: to be the normal. We want it to be abnormal
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  Speaker 2: that you come across a crash or that you're subjected
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  Speaker 2: to the results of a crash.
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  Speaker 1: Ye. Well, Paul Fausman, NTI Traffic Police Senior Sergeant. It's
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: always good to catch up with you. Thanks so much
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  Speaker 1: for your time today.
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  Speaker 2: Thank you, Kay, just for your listeners. Just be aware
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  Speaker 2: schools back next week of course, yes, school will be
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  Speaker 2: back there and expect to see us.
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  Speaker 1: Thank you, thank you. You are listening to Mix one
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  Speaker 1: oh four point nine.