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ROSIE COOPER MP WELCOMES PROGRESS ON CAUSING SERIOUS INJURY BY CARELESS DRIVING OFFENCE

Immediate release: Monday 14 September

West Lancashire MP Rosie Cooper has welcomed the Justice Secretary’s announcement today that the new offence of causing serious injury by careless driving is set to be proposed early next year.

She commented: “It is clear there is a desire for change both from the public and from MPs in Parliament, but the Ministry of Justice has until now failed to make any real progress on creating the new offence. I very much welcome that the new offence of causing serious injury by careless driving will be included in the White Paper.

“I have often said that Government needs to get a move on and act now to ensure appropriate punishments are handed down to dangerous drivers, and also in the hope that tougher sentences will deter these careless and reckless drivers, save lives and reduce instances of serious injury.

“Victims’ families want to see justice and for nobody else to go through what they have had to experience.”

Rosie Cooper MP spoke about the new offence in a debate in the House of Commons supporting a petition calling on the Government to honour its promise of bringing in life sentences for those convicted of dangerous driving.

That petition read: In October 2017, the Government promised life sentences for death by dangerous driving. It’s now 2019. Innocent people have been killed, but nothing has changed. The law is out of date. Anyone convicted of death by dangerous driving should receive life imprisonment with a minimum tariff of 15 years. If more than one person is killed or injured, the sentences must run separately. At the same time in 2017, the Government had also promised to create the new driving offence of causing serious injury by careless driving, which if it had been in place at the time Burscough resident Georgia Addy was hit by a careless van driver, would have meant he would have got a greater punishment than the £500 fine he received.

Speaking in the debate in 2019, MP Rosie said: “The Government promised to introduce life sentences for death by dangerous driving and to create a new offence of causing serious injury by careless driving two years ago.

“Many families across this country including my constituent Mr. Addy from Burscough whose daughter was mown down in 2016 by a driver who received a fine of £500 and no jail sentence, all these people are waiting for these promises to become law.

“Does my Hon Friend agree that not only do we need the appropriate punishment but effective deterrence for dangerous and careless driving, excessive speeding, reckless joyriding and we need it now, everyone has waited long enough.”