Welcome to the Behind the Shield podcast. As
always, my name is James Geering, and I am so
excited to release this episode for two reasons.
Firstly, this is episode 1 ,200, so 1 ,200 episodes
now are in this free library that is the Behind
the Shield podcast. Secondly, to commemorate
this landmark episode, I'm bringing a topic that
I think affects every single one of us out there.
Neil Kinnear is not only a psychologist, but
also a behavioral specialist in the world of
road safety. And for those of you out there listening
who wear a uniform for a living, I'm sure like
myself, some of your most horrific memories are
those fatalities we have on the road. It's also
something that scares the hell out of me now
as a father of an 18 and a 24 year old, the age
bracket that is very, very high risk when it
comes to deaths on the road as well. So in this
conversation, we discuss a host of topics, from
Neil's journey into the world of psychology,
how that led him to understanding the mind of
the driver, because as he points out, behind
every single wheel is a human being, the frameworks
and cultural philosophies behind the safest drivers
in the world, the fallacy behind fear -mongering
for safety, the efficacy of driving tests, setting
high standards, how insurance companies are using
GPS to improve road safety, the impact of sleep
deprivation on safety on our roads, and so much
more. Now, before we get to this incredible conversation,
as I say every week, please just take a moment.
Go to whichever app you listen to this on, subscribe
to the show, leave feedback, and leave a rating.
Every single five -star rating truly does elevate
this podcast, therefore making it easier for
others to find. And as I mentioned, this is now
a free library of 1 ,200 episodes now. So all
I ask in return is that you help share these
incredible men and women's stories so I can get
them to every single person on planet Earth who
needs to hear them. So with that being said,
I introduce to you... Neil Kinnear. Enjoy. Well,
Neil, I want to start by saying thank you so
much for... Trusting this weirdo that reached
out out of nowhere on the internet and coming
on the Behind the Shield podcast today. Not at
all. Thank you for reaching out. Honoured to
be on the podcast. I've listened to a few of
the people that you've interviewed previously
and had on the podcast, and they've got just
remarkable backgrounds and stories. So yeah,
it's an honor to be on the podcast, so thanks.
Thank you. So very first question, where on planet
Earth are we finding you today? So I'm based
just west of London, but obviously my accent
is not quite suitable for that area, so I am
originally from Glasgow in Scotland. Well, let's
start there. So tell me a little bit about your
upbringing, what your parents did, how many siblings?
So I was a very standard middle -class upbringing,
I would say, for Britain. You know, three -bed,
semi -detached house in the suburbs of Glasgow.
My dad was an insurance broker. My mum was just
an administrative assistant. And I had an older
sister who was very much someone I looked up
to and led the way and was always... excellent
at everything she did which uh which always made
it difficult to follow um but yeah you mentioned
your dad was in insurance did he cover you know
car insurance that kind of area that you ended
up finding yourself you know becoming an expert
in yes it's a really it's a strange one he he
loved cars and uh and motoring and and motorsport
and so i you know i grew up with a you know an
interest in it as well um but it wasn't My passion
or interest in that area did not lead me to where
I am today or the career path I went down. It
was very much I followed a flow of life and life
led me into this role. What about sports and
exercise? What were you playing and doing when
you were in school ages? Very much football was
my... you know, the big thing. I enjoyed all
sports. I did everything. You know, loved getting
on my bike and cycling. Loved playing tennis.
But I played football, you know, like every day
after school. It's straight down. The first thing
you did was jump on the bike, go straight down
to the park and kick the ball around. And for
your listeners, obviously soccer. But yeah, that
was the joy. I still play today, just clearly
not quite as with quite the veracity that I did.
It's funny that you say that because I actually
play now. I hadn't played for years. I did martial
arts for a long time, but I actually started
playing like two, two and a half years ago now
with a group just on a Sunday. But I have this
conversation with people all the time. I don't
know if it was still the case when you were in
school because I'm obviously a little bit older
than you, but I don't remember there being any
kind of. super high performance when it came
to sports in schools. You know, we all have those,
you know, that one kid that you know that was
just phenomenal and they went off and, you know,
joined a team and did the kind of farm thing
there. But the rest of us, we just played sports,
you know, and there wasn't like, you know, elite
gyms where you were, you know, doing strength
and conditioning or anything. But what I saw
was, as we're having this conversation now, his
two British men that are still playing sports
and still, you know, argue in good shape, you
know, in whatever age we are now. What I've seen
in America is they push performance at such a
high level in the schools and the colleges that
more often than not, these young athletes break
and then they get burned out and they don't continue
to exercise. And you see obviously what we have
at the moment, which is three quarters of the
country is overweight or obese. So it's an interesting
perspective on the two different philosophies.
Yeah, it's interesting. It's interesting. Yeah,
I do wonder if a push for performance and sort
of excelling and elite, you know, elite level
performance in sports at a young age could really
put people off who are never going to reach that,
which is most of us. And actually, the great
values of sport are about the enjoyment of it.
Obviously, the health you get from it. But really,
Some of those benefits, the health benefits,
I didn't care about that as a kid. I just did
it because I enjoyed it and I enjoyed being with
my friends and running around and playing that
sport. I've generally always just followed sports
that I enjoy doing. Squash was another one that
I just found really enjoyable. There's a tactical
nature to it, but it's fast -paced. Basically,
I've realized if I'm chasing a ball, I'll run
a lot, lot further than if I just go for a run.
I actually don't enjoy running just for the sake
of it. But if you put me in a game situation,
I love it. I love it. I'm the same. I think this
is why, and I've said this a lot recently, Mud
runs, Spartan races, tough mudders, those kind
of things, CrossFit, you know, with the handstands
and the ropes. I think it's less about murdering
yourself, more about the community and the element
of play. Because I couldn't climb a rope when
I was a kid, and I can climb a rope now without
my legs at 51 years old. So I think that's just
it. You've got to put the enjoyment back into
movement, and then you're not thinking about
it as fitness anymore. Yeah, exactly, exactly.
While we're on the subject, I just finished watching
the last season of Welcome to Wrexham. I don't
know if you've seen that or not, but it was really
amazing because growing up, you know, I grew
up in the, I'm a child of the 70s, so the 80s
was kind of when I was really starting to see
the world around us. That was when all the football
people were murdering each other at stands and
pushing walls on top of each other and not, I
would say, the glory days of football. So I didn't
really lean into supporting a side. And then
fast forward even further. And now there's just
like billionaires buying these premier clubs
and no one from that club is even from that town.
And so Wrexham really, really educated me on
what football is supposed to be about. And it's
funny that two American actors, you know, buy
a Welsh club and educate an Englishman on the
sport that's native to his country. But in this
world now that we're seeing tribalism be used
in a negative way and people pit against each
other. It really kind of reinforced the importance
of tribalism on the positive side and that community,
that kind of it takes a village mentality. What
is your philosophy of that whole environment
where tribalism can be positive versus where
it's actually used in a negative way? Big question.
So, yeah, I think it's a really interesting one
because football is... fascinating that way that
you it is tribal you you know you've got a team
you've got a color you've got a strip you've
got all the identifiers that you have to create
a group and then you have your in group are people
wearing the same color same strip as you and
your out group which is pretty much anyone else
in any other team um and and you'll go along
and then sit in a stadium separated and segregated
particularly in in the uk that's the case and
and much of europe but not necessarily everywhere
and certainly not in all sports rugby is very
different and and just those two comparisons
even the football rugby one is a really interesting
one where in rugby you just have everyone together
regardless of who you support but i think in
football you you can have sport allows that human
nature of tribalism an identity, an in -group
versus out -group, to, I guess, expose itself
as our innate way of being. But what most of
the time is a safe way to do it. And you can
have colleagues and you support different teams
and you'll go in after the weekend and you'll
have banter about... the result of something
or whatever. But it's at a level where you've
got a respect for one another, even though you're
in different groups or have different identities.
And that is, I think, a very positive foundation
for us to use what was probably an instinctual,
you know, we're going to go back centuries, was
probably an instinctual protection mechanism.
that you've got your urine group and don't trust
anyone that's not in your in group because really
they might be coming for your food or you know
coming to kill you so you know i think we've
had we've adapted that over centuries in our
societies and sport provides that way for us
to still expose it and and it to come out but
in a safer environment when it's well managed
um including the 70s you know certainly uh you
know the english example it at times was spilling
over and so that can happen it can get too much
but on the whole if you look at sport generally
it allows that to happen in a very safe environment
and in a way that is now seen as entertainment
in many cases rather than anything else but actually
there's a lot of those very innate aspects of
us as humans coming out within that I think what's
interesting, one of my guests made this point.
You can have two teams at each other's throats,
you know, whatever the kind of derby teams are.
And they air quotes hate each other. But then,
you know, they've joined the British team or
the English team, excuse me. And now we're all
cheering the same people on. And it's the same
thing, you know, back home, you're from rival
towns or whatever, but then you go to Benidorm.
And you meet someone in a hotel and, oh, you're
from London? Yeah, I'm from London. All of a
sudden, it's not, you know, Arsenal, Tottenham
anymore. It's just two Londoners. So it's interesting
how when you look a little bit more macro, the
kind of negative side of that tribalism disappears.
And now your tribalism becomes, you know, well,
I'm English or I'm Scottish or I'm British or
I'm European or whatever the thing is. So, I
mean, it can be so, so positive. someone said
to me there's a difference between a civilian
and a citizen and i think this is where there's
you know that's the same thing as kind of patriot
versus you know nationalist you know you do do
you just live in a country or do you contribute
to that country and if you contribute to that
country then i think you really feel the value
of that tribe yeah very nice way of putting it
i like it yeah Well, you mentioned that driving
safety wasn't your initial career aspiration.
So when you were in school, what were you dreaming
of becoming? Oh, I mean, at that time, it was
football or Formula One driver. That was the
dreams. Yeah, I didn't have an academic desire,
if I'm honest, as in a vision of where I was
going. wanted to achieve and do well, but I didn't
have a drive towards a particular topic or subject.
Even falling into psychology as my degree when
I went to university, that was somewhat a random
choice. I hadn't done it as a topic. It just
sounded interesting. I thought, I'll give that
a go. Which isn't necessarily the best way of
going about it, but I think we put a lot of pressure
on young people to decide their future lives
at a very young age. And when I was leaving school,
I just didn't have that foresight to say what
I really wanted to do. And so I just went with
what I thought I might enjoy or what I'd find
interesting. And that was it. And then that led
me. um following you know after uni i went traveling
for a couple of years just to enjoy seeing the
world um and i i ended up taking a job as a psychology
tutor at a university in new zealand um covering
for somebody's maternity leave i have no idea
why they they obviously couldn't find anyone
else because i couldn't have been a very uh hugely
qualified grant you know as a candidate other
than just being a psychology graduate of about
a year but I enjoyed it and then when I eventually
came back to Scotland I ended up sort of lecturing
and psychology back at university and college
and in schools and then by chance got offered
an opportunity to do a PhD with a psychologist
who was a transport psychologist And I was, yeah,
I was fascinated. Because despite having done
a degree in psychology, I'd never really thought
about the application of it to driving or the
transport world. And this made me look into it.
And I was like, that's nuts. Everything about
transport. is the movement of goods or people.
That's all transport is. And ultimately, even
if you're moving goods, you need people to do
that. And so everything about transport is about
people, but we just don't think of it in that
way. And so it's still a niche subject, even
though I've realised there is a whole community
of... similar -ish people to me around the world
but it's still a pretty niche subject and and
so yeah that I took that opportunity um it gave
me three years of funding to do a PhD and I albeit
he didn't have a topic he just said there's some
funding do what you like and he was a great guy
a great professor But he was very much, you go
and work it out. You do it for yourself. So that
first year, I just spent reading and reading
and reading. And I went down many different paths
of potential topics to choose for the PhD and
focus on. One I was close to doing was the fact
that most in the military, probably the greatest
risk of death for them is not to do with combat.
It's actually going off duty and driving home.
It's the moment that they're at their greatest
risk. And that fascinated me. I almost went down
that pathway. In the end, I focused on... Just
what I saw as a pattern, we call it the novice
driver problem. And so in every jurisdiction
you look at, we train people to become drivers.
We train them, they take a test and they get
their license. And at that point of licensure,
you're basically giving them a certificate to
say, you're good enough to drive on our roads.
freely, on your own, right? Unrestricted. But
at that very point, they are at the greatest
risk of having a crash that they will ever be
for the rest of their career as a driver. I say
career, not literally as in that's the job, just
as in they've got a license and they'll probably
drive for the rest of their life. And at that
point, they're at such... elevated risk it's
untrue and then a really interesting thing happens
that over the next six to twelve months their
level of risk comes down rapidly and then it
sort of starts to tail off over the next two
to three years and by by sort of three years
of following drive getting your license you're
at a level of risk you'll probably be at for
most of your life right And every chart I looked
at for every country that produced the data,
it looked the same. It's exactly the same. That's
regardless of the type of training, learning
required, the type of test required, or what
happens post -test. And you see the same pattern.
And so you have a license. Young people usually
making up like, you know, seven to 10 % of the
driving population, but they'll be involved in
about a quarter of all the fatal crashes, right?
So they're overrepresented. But you see a very
similar figure in every country. And so my thinking,
well, the question I asked was, what on earth
are people learning in that first six to 12 months
that makes them become safer? Because they are
under no tuition. They're not learning from anyone.
We're not giving them education or training.
They are learning themselves. And that was the
question I asked. I don't know if you want me
to answer it. I do. I'm waiting with bated breath.
I'm on the edge of my seat. There's not many
people who have been on the edge of their seat
to hear about my PhD, I'll be honest. I'm a bit
of a weirdo, so there we go. In short, I'll not
take you through the whole thing, but in short,
what I brought together were theories from the
field of neuroscience, the field of decision
-making, and the field of risk and judgment,
as well as, obviously, driver behavior theory.
But you can bring those in, and what you realize
is that Driver behavior is in one way exceptionally
simple. We can only do two things when we're
driving to affect the vehicle, and that is alter
the speed and change the direction. So driving
is really simple. We're only doing two things.
But in reality, it's a really complex task. Mentally,
we're taking in information at a speed. that
we never evolved to travel at, right? We evolved
running. That was as fast as we got. Then possibly
on horseback, but that's actually quite late
on in our development. So really, you know, driving
at the speeds we do, information is flowing at
us at some rate. And when we do that, we have
to find ways of managing the amount of information
flow that's coming to us. which is demanding
for our minds, right? And so we have to work
out what's important in our scene and what's
not. And so you can start to see through theory,
the theory in neuroscience and our decision -making
theory, and particularly, you know, a lot of
this you've now seen published in popular psychology
books that have become very famous, like, you
know, Blink and things like that. And, you know,
where... In decision making, we've sort of got
two ways of processing that and risk. We've got
two ways of processing the sort of intuitive
way that's really fast and quick. And then you've
got the more deliberative way where we compare
things against each other and work out what's
best. now it's very clear we can't do that when
driving at speed so we have to rely on our intuitive
approach and and so that means we're using a
certain part of our processing for decision making
and then what you realize from neuroscience theory
that's come about is that all that computational
type theory that we went through in the 60s and
70s um that turned us into almost robots and
uh and and made things made it seem like we were
all our brains just worked by one thing to the
next like um like we think of i guess ai now
um it's just not true we have a mind and a body
for a reason and it's because our bodies feel
things and provide our mind with information
about our environment and when those two things
come together our feelings influence and affect
our judgment and The way that works in decision
-making is it biases us to what we decide to
do next. So it doesn't decide for us, but it
will bias your mind into what you then decide
to do behaviorally, which people in marketing
have known for years, and hence they spend so
much on branding, because when you're in an aisle
full of options, the easiest bias you have is
to go for something you know or trust. And it's
the same thing. We do this in our environment.
We will make a choice that seems like the most
beneficial to us, to protect us. And so what
I realized with driving is that we're having
to make a decision constantly. We are in a constant
loop. We don't realize it because most of this
is non -conscious. You don't think about driving
and make a decision every second. I'm going to
change my speed. I'm going to lift off the accelerator
a little bit. I'm going to whatever. But actually,
if you track the pressure on the accelerator
pedal or the gas pedal over a short period of
time, you realize that it shifts quite a lot.
We just don't realize we're doing it. And so
we are moderating the amount of demand coming
into our brains at any one point. It's the same
thing that affects you when you take on another
task, like you start a mobile phone call whilst
driving. You will likely end up slowing down
so that you can manage the demand in your environment,
right? That's typically what happens. And we've
all seen that person on the highway and they're
driving slow. And then two minutes later, they're
flying past you because they've finished the
phone call. And so bringing this back together,
what I realized is that what we learn in that
early period of driving through experience is
to identify. what in our environment matters,
i .e. what do I need to anticipate or what cues
in my environment come together, converge, to
let me understand there's potential risk ahead.
But if I don't act now, as in that might be just
changing your speed a little bit, and what that
does is negate your path where you are coming
into conflict with a vehicle coming on an on
-ramp, for example. And what you see from learner
drivers or novice drivers is they will continue
at the same speed in that conflict path. They
will get to the point where that vehicle then
comes onto the highway and they have to slam
on the brake at the last minute. Usually they'll
get away with it. But if other factors are in
play, like maybe they're on their phone or they're
distracted or whatever, then they're more likely
to be involved in a crash because they've got
themselves into a situation where they need to
take a reactive response. What experienced drivers
most of the time do is we just slightly change
our speed and we remove that conflict path altogether.
And so we avoid getting into those situations.
And so I demonstrated this in the laboratory
while people watched hazard perception clips
and I had them hooked up to skin conductance
responses to get their background physiology
and identified that basically you know there's
a learning curve that starts to happen that that
experienced drivers are showing physiological
responses well in advance of any of a hazard
happening in an what i called an anticipatory
period so not a reactive period but an anticipatory
period and learner drivers literally didn't show
any response at all in this period they just
didn't have it and novice drivers were responding
to some scenes but not others so they were sort
of part of the way up And that depends on how
much experience they reported they'd driven.
So those that had more than 1 ,000 miles showed
that they were on a pathway on this learning
curve. And so it's really critical that people
get this experience, but we try and help them
do that in the safest way possible. That was
sort of the outcome of all this. No, it did.
It did completely. It's fascinating. I've never
heard that explained before, but it does make
so much sense, especially I love to go back in
our evolution and apply principles and say, does
that make sense? A thousand years ago as a human
being. So the carnivore diet definitely works
for some people. You're removing processed food,
which I would argue is probably the most powerful
part. But a thousand years ago, we were able
to eat meat three, four times a day. I highly
doubt it. So that's where I kind of hold the
blueprint. But what you're talking about, that
amount of information that you're getting as
a driver, 70, 80 miles an hour on a motorway,
with all the cars changing lanes and the weather
and the change in light and things stopped on
the side of the road. I mean, it is an insane
amount of information that we're trying to process.
And as we sit here, I'm going to knock on wood
now. I haven't had an accident yet, but... I
grew up on a farm. I was so lucky to be driving
for a long time. So probably kind of adjusted
that curve slightly just by all the things that
I would have been driving along in the farm.
But what's interesting, what I want to ask you,
you saw this same curve. The result, was that
dependent on how well they were trained though?
You had the same shape, but if you have much
higher driving standards, did that... that flattening
out end up at a higher level than somewhere like
the US where the standards are very low? So it's
a good question, and it's a really difficult
one to answer. Partly because you're seeing these
data at a population level, and it's hiding a
lot of the nuance of what's going on and how
people are. trained and learning and it's it's
showing you just the large large generalized
effects um and so the impact of training and
education um has i mean it's constantly debated
constantly and you you would fully expect that
there has to be some impact of the quality of
education and training that somebody gets over
the outcomes that you would expect them to achieve
that said quite often in the published scientific
literature review after review particularly for
education finds that it has very well almost
none no effect on on safety um outcomes like
crashes maybe a minimal effect but we'll come
back to that in a second um because there may
be people going whoa hold on a second right but
ultimately you know education if you just take
that as an intervention to improve safety it
doesn't show that it has an effect the quality
of training as i say i think if you look in professional
areas you know you there's probably good examples
of where good quality training versus bad quality
training is beneficial for the outcomes that
you're looking for and you would have you'd expect
that in driving too but what seems to it it seemed
really hard to distinguish what is good quality
training versus what is low quality training
and in any country you probably have a mix of
all so even in the uk you will have you know
driving instructors that are really good and
focused on how you're not just passing the test
they're focused on how you will learn to be a
driver beyond your test and how you will behave
beyond the test and they will take you into places
that you don't need to necessarily learn to pass
the test but they'll take you to places and prepare
you for post -test but not all instructors will
do that a lot of instructors will just train
you to pass a test which is a skills largely
a skills -based test it's not the skills you
can learn the skills to drive a motor vehicle
really quickly really easily um and yet that's
what most tests in most countries focus on and
so they're just not preparing people for post
-test solo driving um and i think the differences
that you might be referring to in terms of you
know heightened us crash rates versus other developed
countries. For me, this comes down to a much
broader issue, which I would sort of term the
road safety culture and the culture and perspective
on basically on the trauma on the roads. And
I deliberately use the word trauma because that's
what it is. When you break it down, like if you
look at it from a different perspective, which
people don't tend to do, when you do, you know,
I think it's something like every 13 minutes
someone is killed on the roads in the US. Every
13 seconds someone is injured on the roads in
the US. And this is reported stuff, right? Now,
if you... That's roughly 110 people dying a day
in the US. So, you know, if you put that in any
other transport mode, like imagine five domestic
airliners coming down each week, killing everyone
on board. What would the reaction to that be?
Very different. Very different, right? and yet
trauma on the road is just accepted and in a
very bizarre way like that that's a strange mindset
that we have that accepts that level of trauma
to continue year after year um you know it is
it's consistent and what really gets me like
fascinated by this and you know is the fact that
society doesn't challenge it more and those in
charge don't challenge it more if it was something
else i feel like it would be challenged but for
some reason it's accepted and i don't really
understand why and from the perspective of like
yourself i i've often thought you know i work
a lot with first responders in this country.
I spent time as a collision investigator in the
UK and attended live crash scenes and occasionally
was first on scene because we were in a vehicle
and would hear of a crash and location and we
would head there and sometimes we were the first
there. So I've had minimal experience of this
compared to probably the likes of yourselves
and others listening but if we just look at it
from their perspective on that every 13 seconds
there's a crash where someone's injured there's
a first responder attending that right and every
13 minutes someone's dead that's traumatic to
turn up to That's traumatic to deal with. And
it's also massively expensive to society in many,
many different ways. And I think one estimate
in the US was like 1 .4 trillion in the cost
of all of this when you take into account lost
income and, you know, emergency services, work,
health care, etc. It's huge. And it staggers
me that you can have this size of trauma. The
impact on the cost to society at a financial
level, the impact on families and communities
that continues year after year, and yet the road
safety culture doesn't seem to evolve in its
common narrative. And that's the bit that needs
to change. I'm aware of the road safety community,
and there's a very strong road safety community
in the US. um that is doing a lot of leading
work but that narrative doesn't it struggles
to get into the the common everyday narrative
or even the political narrative a lot of the
time this is what really blew me away and we
were talking about this before we hit record
but when i looked at the statistics we lose that
the numbers that you gave us is 40 000 americans
every year that die actually die um hundreds
of thousands probably with life -changing injuries
and i think if my memory serves me right it was
either six or eight million accidents so kind
of as you're alluding to let's say it's not even
a terrible crash but it's one where again poor
driving has contributed to you know one two three
vehicles now you've blocked an entire motorway
or freeway or whatever it is now all those people
are late to work all those goods that are supposed
to be delivered are being held up not to mention
as you said the the the impact of the people
in their cars and the responders you know that's
for every single accident but you know just to
kind of give you a back story so i i did uh my
driving test back when it was um yeah i'm sure
it's probably the same but back then most people
usually took two or three times to even pass
it it was very you know very very hard and the
british roads are very dangerous you know i grew
up in the west country and it's all lanes and
you know there's no medians in between you know
it's just two -way roads um you know wet and
gray and miserable all the time so the lighting
isn't good the road safety you know the road
conditions aren't good Um, and we were held to
a very high standard. I was very fortunate. Like
I said, I drove a lot on the farm, took a load
of driving lessons, passed the test. As you said,
I took, I think it was at least one or two more
now learning how to drive on the motorway because
you can't drive on the motorway when you're a
learner driver in England that we couldn't then.
So that post -test trading as well. Now, fast
forward a couple of decades, I moved to not a
couple of decades, sorry, a decade. Now I moved
to America. I land in Florida, go to the DMV,
get in the car, do some, you know, driving around
a car park, drive around some local roads, come
back. And I'm like, OK, that must be kind of
like the warm up. And then they say, congratulations,
you passed. And then I didn't really think much
of it otherwise other than, OK, that was easy.
Good. But then I go into my career, see hundreds
of, you know, of wrecks, many of whom are very
badly injured or killed. And then I start thinking,
OK, well, this is one of the issues. Now, my
son, how old is he now? 18. So two years ago,
took his test and I watched him do the exact
same test. And we're talking, you know, 20, basically
20 years later, two more decades after that first
one. And so this is where, you know, I'm really
curious about that standard. I think what you're
talking about. It needs to be a big part of the
conversations. We give them this, you know, license
to drive a death trap. You know, where is that
post -training and that, you know, the ability
to flatten that curve a little bit. But the contrast
between America and Britain's driving test, you
know, Britain, you're a year older as well. And
the fact that if I'm understanding it correctly,
per capita, we have 10 times more deaths per
capita than we do in the UK. I think there's
a lot. a lot to that as well. I think when you
barely educate to the point where very few people
use their blinkers, very few people understand
why you put distance between you and the other
person, very few people understand to stay in
the inside lane unless you're passing on a motorway.
And so you have these frustrated drivers trying
to get past these three that are side by side.
As a first responder, I can see these contributing
factors. But as you said, in 22 years of living
in this country, I've seen zero, zero conversation
on addressing anything proactively to save these
tens of thousands of lives that we lose each
year. Yeah. And the sad thing about it is that
these are preventable, right? This is a man -made
system. And so we've created this transport system.
And if you go into other transport systems, like
air or rail, also man -made, but their approach
to injury and death on these systems is very
different. When something happens, okay, there's
a really significant investigation to understand
why that happened. Where was the failure in the
chain of events? What are we going to do to put
in place so this never happens again? And so...
Look, eliminating all risk is really challenging,
and particularly on the roads where, look, it's
very different to those other transport systems.
You don't just have the odd operator. You have
many operators, and they're all human, which
means they're all fallible, and they will all
make errors. They will all be doing some stupid
things at different times, and they all come
from different backgrounds, have different...
different training, different experiences, and
different attitudes. And so it's a dynamic risk
system that's very hard to manage. So you are
always fighting risk within that system. And
it's how much effort do you want to put in to
manage that risk? Because if you want to, you
can really reduce it. You can reduce it significantly.
But the truth is, we don't. There's either not
some, I don't know what's missing, what the exact
ingredient is, but there's a will to make a difference
that doesn't exist, whether that be from a political
perspective or a financial one or a societal
one. But we seem to accept the level of trauma
that occurs as what we pay for that mobility
and freedom. But there are things we know we
can do. One is managing speeds better, right?
And I want to say the obvious one that always
gets touted, which is, well, we build cars that
can go twice the speed limit, the maximum speed
limit. Well, that's not necessary in that system,
but we do it and we allow it. That's okay, right?
I don't want to step on that freedom because
people like that. But we could have in place
a better... training and licensing, for example.
You mentioned the test. Tests are actually a
really poor predictor of future driving behavior
generally, even in the UK. But what it does do,
and what you've highlighted there, is the difference
between the level you need to pass the test,
which means you set the bar for what people will
then work up to. And if the test is really easy,
then people don't put in the effort. because
they don't need to, right? A test is always just
seen as, what do I need to do to pass this? That's
always the way. And if the bar is quite low,
then you will see a low level of effort. So in
the UK, you have a hazard perception test and
a theory test and the actual driving on the road
test, which has been strengthened over the last
few years. So it's a reasonable bar. And what
we have seen is that each time you change that,
change the way that they train to adapt to the
test so the test is a powerful implement in getting
people to to train more and get more experience
and particularly in certain ways and what we
know is the the more experience you have in that
learner phase and the more varied experience
so you've driven on high speed roads you've driven
um at night you're driven in bad weather you're
getting lots of varied experience And you're
driving people in the car. But ultimately, you're
doing it all with someone beside you that you
trust and can guide you if you're doing something
a bit wrong. But the more you have of that, the
safer you are after your test. And so we want
to encourage that. And then after the test, we
know the situations that are risky. We know it's
usually when a young person is driving with their
similar age friends in the car. We know that
driving at night is much more risky for this
age group, largely because that's when they socialize.
That's when the roads are empty. But it's also
when, perceptually, it's much trickier to drive.
And often they can be driving on faster rural
roads that don't have much of a safety margin.
And so it's a powerful contributor to the risk
in that situation. And that's why in the US you
have graduated driver licenses that... aim to
just protect these two known bits of risk for
the first six months of driving, for example.
But I think that only applies in many states
until someone is 18. And after 18, they don't
have to do that bit, which is problematic. So
we know how to manage that level of risk. And
there's many other ways to manage risk. You could
use telematics. We did a study of using telematics
to understand driving behavior as a form of licensing
rather than a one -off test, which just tells
you how someone performs in a moment. Well, let's
look at their driving style over time. If you
can demonstrate you're a good driver over time,
we can give you feedback. We can help you and
guide you and make you a good driver. And that
will be something that will be longer term. We
help you with your habits and your formation.
We need to change the view that this is a driver
problem. This is a system problem. And drivers
will make mistakes. Drivers will do things wrong.
And we are all vulnerable as humans to being
killed because we can only withstand so much
force. the perspective of the safe system comes
into play, which is an international approach
to changing the way we see road safety. And I
know that in some states this is being adopted
and the road safety community in the US has put
this forward as well. But really, that's where
this needs to go. We need to see this as a system
problem and it needs everyone to play a part
in that, from the driver all the way up to those
who manage. and manage the roads and the infrastructure
and the vehicles. When you look at the entire
planet, which countries would you hold up as
an example for other countries to follow? Well,
you've got some of your Scandinavian countries
that have very good safety records, like Norway
and Denmark. They have cities where there's been
no fatality in over a year sort of thing because
they've managed risk so well. And that's largely
around managing risk around speed on roads around
the city. So if you're managing a city, whenever
you've got people and pathways towards, say,
a school or somewhere for education, then you
know there's going to be young people. We move
to the middle lane knowing that cars will be
merging in. When they kind of pass, they'll come
back over to the right lane. If people are walking,
they see they're about to get to a zebra crossing.
The car will stop. Pedestrian will say thank
you. The driver will wave back, and then everyone
goes. It's a real feeling of sharing the road.
Here, and I live in Florida. It's a fight. It's
like Mad Max on the road a lot of time. And don't
get me wrong, not tarring Americans. There are
some phenomenal drivers here as well. But I have
a roundabout in my subdivision. And if I see
someone even use an indicator on the roundabout,
it'll be one in 100 times, for example, which
if you don't use an indicator on the roundabout,
you've just negated the benefits of a roundabout
because you're not flowing anymore. But when
I reverse engineer, the British people, the queuing
and that there is a kind of sense of of um manners
which i think is extended onto the road whereas
every commercial here that talks about a truck
is basically you need to get the biggest baddest
vehicle and you can own the road and fuck everyone
else basically is kind of the messaging and you
see it on the road so not tarring an entire nation
with the same brush but again going back to the
systems that seem to have the lowest incidence
of deaths Is there a cultural element as well
as far as understanding the road safety, sharing
the road, being considerate that maybe other
countries that have higher death rates aren't
getting on a cultural level? Most definitely.
Culture very much feeds into the behaviors you
see on the road. And it can only be how you can...
understand the differences you see from country
to country um and you know you've so used the
us and uk you know i i was in in delhi in december
and it's just a and traveling through rural india
and it's a whole a whole other culture of the
ways of using the road and and other perspectives
and so there's no doubt that just I mean, I think
the impact of that common culture of road use
is so important to the outcomes you get from
that. And the outcomes are how much death and
serious injury are you willing to accept for
our level of freedom and mobility that we have
on the roads? That's ultimately what it comes
down to. But we don't ask that question. We never
ask ourselves directly that question. But, you
know. And there's a fantastic educational video
that you can find on YouTube that was done in,
I think it was Australia. And they asked a guy
on the street, seemingly random guy, but clearly
wasn't in the end, how many deaths are acceptable
each year on our roads in Western Australia or
whatever it is. And he sort of says a number,
you know, thinks of a number, right? A bit random.
And then they sort of go, well, what if that
looked like this? And then around the corner
down the street comes a big crowd of people fronted
by his family, right? And then they say, how
about zero? And you can see him get emotional.
And he's like, yeah, yeah, it should be zero.
We just don't frame it in the right way. And
if you have a culture where it's all about you
on the road, all you're looking out for is you,
what we've lost is that sense of community and
that sense of... uh altruism to others and i
would need to work with others to achieve a common
goal which is that we all want to get to work
and get to where we're going or you know see
our friends our family we all need to do this
but let's do it without someone dying right that
that'd be better wouldn't it and but we don't
think that way no one thinks that way and so
that's a really hard thing to get across and
so i You know, there's a huge challenge there.
But ultimately, most of this comes from the top.
If you don't have from the top a cascade of what
is important on this road system, is it that
we can do what we like and we get to where we
want to? And as you said, like everyone else,
if that's the sense from the top, then that's
what everyone's going to go to. But if that perspective
changes and you see the impact, when you tax
something very small, you add a tiny, you know,
as a behavioral science, you add a few pence
onto something, you can change behavior in the
masses. It's the same thing with road safety.
If you start to prioritize things that are going
to reduce risk on the road, you will see massive
changes in the number of people that are killed
and injured. It's very simple. And so we don't
have... well I don't feel there's the leadership
that is required and the strong decision making
required at the very top to empower those who
actually know what they're doing in the right
you know there's people in very good positions
in great agencies who would like to do the right
thing but can't don't have the power but if they
were given empowered to do so things could change
and and improve um but i think it all cascades
down from the top that's a beautiful example
with the australian commercial um i'm in the
process of turning my books into a tv show and
the reason being you don't really see the firefighter
story very often and you certainly if you do
it's kind of glamorized and the hero and pulling
babies out of um you know fires and stuff but
i think there's more value in seeing the world
through our eyes and to use that example if you
ask pretty much any first responder where are
the worst things that you've seen even firefighters
more often than not it's not going to be the
fire you might have a handful of fire stories
but most of it is going to be on the road so
for us every single fatality is horrendous because
we see the screams of the family you know if
people are on scene like it's it's really you
know it's so deep if you ask law enforcement
the death notification same thing so it is so
real for us i think it's it's even more infuriating
for the first responders out there because and
i've had this if you ask a lot of us you know
road rage is a big thing with us Because if I
see someone driving like an asshole, and I have
shouted at people before, because I might have
just the night before cut someone out of a car.
And that person, the version of that person was
sitting on the curb, throwing themselves a pity
party while they just killed three people. And
now they're sad. And now they get it. But it's
too fucking late by that point. So I wish you
could, you know, like in the movies where they
kind of put their hands on someone's head and
they see all their trauma. If you could do that
to the world when we change drive safety, you
know, overnight, I'm sure. But we don't have
that ability. And I'm going to hopefully put
this on the screen. But it's so important for
us to have this front and center, because when
COVID happened, there were tickers on the screen.
And, you know, but then after it went away, oh,
we're OK now. Well, no, there's still those.
you know horrendous numbers dying from heart
disease and you know on the roads and overdoses
but people shrug their shoulders now well you
know it is what it is and you ask someone in
the medical field it's not it is what it is because
every single one of those we pull a sheet over
it stays with us so i think this community is
one that has a voice that maybe can actually
force this issue oh no doubt um i mean if we
truly accounted for the perspective of the first
responder on a day -to -day basis and what they
have to face on scene, those that have to then
deal with the families and inform them. You know,
I've seen policemen talk about this and openly
cry, talking about the first time they had to
knock on somebody's door to tell them that their
son or daughter had been killed in a car accident.
And that, you know, that's got to be horrific.
And you're dealing with that on a daily basis.
You don't even have time to process that trauma.
You know, I recall the first fatality I attended
as, you know, when I was doing my close investigation.
And I recall one in particular that was two.
two young guys presumably apparently driving
back from uh something that they'd been attending
uh and i think it occurred about three or four
in the morning and they'd veered off the road
and hit a tree and the car burst into flames
i remember the sight of that scene vividly and
it's never left me and My experience is nothing
compared to what first responders would have,
because I did this just for six months. But I'm
aware that having been at that scene and then
also witnessed how the first responders dealt
with it, and in many cases it's through black
humour and ways of coping that, you know... Questionable
at times, but they have to find a way of normalising
this. And that's the worst part. They're having
to normalise this just to cope. That's not right.
That's just not right. And it's always been on
my mind what they have to deal with on a day
-to -day basis when it comes to that. Fires are
much rarer. And fatalities and fires are probably,
I'm sure, more than they should be, but still
rarer than what you see in the roads. And ultimately,
I imagine a lot of what is dealt with is road
collisions and the trauma with that. You said
something interesting, though. You said if you
could put the hand on someone's head and they
could see all those flashbacks. you would love
to you know you'd like to do that and hope it
would change people's behavior and that's so
this is something i've learned throughout my
career it's the common response and i totally
get it from that experience i had i was like
if only people realized how horrific this is
then it might change how they behave and yet
the science tells us that's just not the case
right and so this is the common response you
get and people think if someone just knew how
awful this is they wouldn't do it and yet there's
a series of interventions that you see over time
that have taken that approach whether that be
taking young people into prisons and saying if
they only knew how awful it is in prison they
wouldn't offend well it failed Those that went
into prison had a 64 % greater rate of offending
than those that didn't. Or if only teenage girls
understood how terrible it would be to get pregnant
and have a child at this age. Well, okay, infant
simulators with teen girls. in Western Australia
found that actually those that were involved
in this intervention had twice the teen birth
rate than the control group. And so actually
you have this weird conflict that what you want
to do when you experience it is just let people
know how awful this is, this scene, because you
think it will affect their behaviour. But the
reality from behavioral science is that that
doesn't work. And all you do with giving people
these scenes is you raise their level of stimulation
and fear, right? So you always find that. So
people will always report, oh, but it was really
emotional. I saw the audience get emotional when
I showed them the car crash scene and things
like that. But they push away from it. And you
don't see a behavior change. And you don't see
an impact on safety from these interventions.
And so that's, I mentioned earlier about education.
That's where education has a really important
role to play, but we have to be very careful
with how we use it. That's really interesting.
I've been a part of the mock. fatal accidents
you know we do we're at high school and we cut
the kid out the car and there's one i saw they
even brought a blooming hearse and had a whole
funeral and everything so they really hammered
that home and then you know being a young englishman
you know the psa's that we had when we were young
were just brutal absolutely brutal that's when
my dad used to show us on farm safety where all
these children were just horrendously murdered
and you and the takeaway was supposed to be that
you wouldn't do that but i certainly remember
the film i even wrote about it in my book but
It's interesting because I wonder as well if
there's an element of, well, if you've seen that
extreme, then the fear of what if maybe isn't
there anymore. And you're actually comfortable
with that extreme because you've been exposed
to it, even though it wasn't your own reality.
So, for example, with the infants, were there
some girls that were like, oh, that's actually
quite nice. And now you've just kind of pushed
them into pregnancy. Yeah, potentially. Or you've
normalized it. Oh, that's normal. And yeah, there
may have been some that... you know, enjoyed
the experience. It gave them something to live
for. Who knows? You know, and same with the prisons.
You normalised the behaviour. You showed them,
I mean, you know, what it was like. And maybe
they went away going, that's not that bad, actually.
There's people I can look up to, you know? And
what we commonly do is normalise behaviours that
are negative, particularly young males. and we
stereotype them into being types of drivers and
things and then they become a driver and lo and
behold they start acting like what they think
they should act like because we've normalized
it in you know tv films and and in society uh
rather than acting as they might want to or they
think they you know or being independent independently
minded but also look When you're talking about
the young age group, they've still got a developing
mind at that point. They're taking risks in all
aspects of their lives. But I've been involved
in road safety education group for Australia
and New Zealand. And when I came in probably
around 10 years ago as part of an expert panel,
we said, look, there isn't really evidence they
were doing the car crash scene in schools and
the education was based around that and we said
look there's not really the evidence for this
that you're going to make a difference what you
know it's not really teaching them anything other
than yeah this is the outcome of a car crash
it's pretty horrific well do you think they don't
know that of course they do like we're not stupid
just seeing it you know dramatized is no different
to what they see in a film but it doesn't mean
it that affects them and so you're not necessarily
going to change their behavior on a day -to -day
basis or how they might respond when they're
then in a social scenario with their friends
one of their friends has been drinking and is
going to drive home and they're going to be a
passenger what's better is if you give them those
real life situations and you sit them down go
okay let's talk about it imagine you're in this
situation how are you going to respond well i'd
find that quite tricky you know um Yeah, I wouldn't
say anything. Okay, well, let's give you some
ways to think about things you could say. And
so what you're doing is starting to arm them
with tools and strategies to manage the situations
that could get them into risky situations in
real life. And so the education becomes supportive
rather than just warning about risks because
they know about risks. They're not stupid. We
often think this, if you only knew. In some ways,
there will be areas they have a lack of knowledge,
and that's fine. Then you do need to give them
some knowledge, but also give them a strategy
to support and cope and deal with the situation
themselves. And if you do that, you empower them.
And one of the most effective educational resources
was one that was not even targeted on road safety
at all. It was a... it was about drugs in in
australia and it just so happened that you know
they followed up the driving behaviors of these
people that were given what's what was called
insight training um to deal with drugs right
so the same thing about scenario based uh you
know what do you do when someone offers you drugs
well let's let's talk about what you might think
and what might be cool about it and then let's
talk about what might you do in that situation
um And what they found was that there was a road
safety benefit to this training about drugs.
Because you're dealing with the same things.
You're empowering young people about making better
decisions. Whether that be about drugs, sex education,
anything else, or driving, you are trying to
develop them as people to make the right decision
in a certain situation. And that's... That's
where this all comes together. And any of your
public health education for young people comes
together under one banner. And so education becomes
a powerful tool when you use it to support. And
that could be supporting a person making a decision.
That could be supporting an enforcement campaign.
If you have an enforcement campaign in your local
area and you also have an educational campaign
to both raise awareness that that is happening
and... increase the perceived legitimacy of why
that campaign, like why are enforcement, why
is enforcement going on about this activity?
Well, because we want to keep our community safe
and that's, you know, it's important to us. And
so it should be important to you. And all of
a sudden you've used education to support a campaign
and make it more effective. So it's a very important
tool, but it has to be used in the right way.
Yeah, no, I agree completely. I think this is
what I see is lacking in the driving education
here in America. Because again, I was taught
by Mr. Evans, my Welsh driving instructor. And
I, you know, both my parents could drive. And
again, they were, you know, manipulating farm
machinery. But we went to a professional driving
instructor to teach, you know, me the right way.
And yes, there was part of obviously the prepping
for the test and, you know, the parallel parking
and reversing around corners and hill starts
and all the skills that we need. But but what
I see is missing here is it's literally you're
learning to, as you said, turn the wheel and
to go forwards and backwards, but rarely even
backwards. Let's be honest in America, you know,
you're driving into a parking spot forwards and
then you just back out. And so there's not the
education of the why. And so I think, you know,
the kind of cautionary tale has a place, but
it's really, well, why do you use your indicator?
You know, if you get someone to say, well, look,
someone's driving behind you. And they need to
know if you're going to suddenly slam on your
brakes and turn left. This is why you're doing
it. Oh, oh, I never thought of that before. You
know what I mean? This is, I think, what's missing
in America through my eyes is there's not an
understanding of why. So then the question is,
well, why are you not just taking, you know,
what is it? 500 grams of pressure to move your
indicator so that people know what you're doing
because you're not thinking that. You're not
the most important person in the road that you're
flowing with this whole group of people. And
you're giving them a heads up. Hey, I'm about
to break or I'm going to turn into this road.
So, you know, you're safe to pull out. You don't
have to wait, you know, when I get there and
then I turn anyway. All these things that infuriate
drivers and the same with the stopping distances.
And why do I, you know, there's three lanes.
Why can't I just drive 65 in the outside lane?
Well, because, you know, when you move over,
people can pass. Everyone gets there on time.
No one's frustrated. I was trying to pass you
on the inside now. Things that, you know, more
advanced drivers, especially people in professions
that, you know, we have to drive fire engines
and teletrucks and ambulances and do skid pan
training. You know, we understand this, but I
think that's what's missing in America. Like
you said, it's not just blindly scaring people,
but, you know, using these cautionary tales to
get attention and say, well, look, let's talk
about, you know, the whys behind some of these
maneuvers that you were taught. I think the average
person, once they understand it, they'll be like,
okay, now I'll start using my indicator. Now
I get it. But I think that why that you alluded
to is one of the biggest missing pieces in the
U .S. education system here. Potentially. And
it shows the opportunity to make a difference,
right? You're telling me about something that
is such a simple, basic element of everyday driving.
that if people did it more commonly, you would
improve the flow of traffic and therefore the
efficiency of everyone probably getting to where
they want to get to. And on a safety level, you
can apply it to other simple behaviors like,
well, if everyone put their seatbelt on, not
as many people would die because a huge number
of fatalities were people not wearing seatbelts.
And so there's a... Another simple bit of education
that could be reinforced. But it also shows the
opportunity that you can have through things
like telematics insurance, where everyone has
to have an insurance, but it's a way of what
it provides is an engagement opportunity where
you can provide people with ways of developing
their... both knowledge and quality of driving
that they actually become better and and and
more informed in a way that doesn't have to be
punitive it can actually be rewarding and the
potential there is huge huge and it's a growing
you know it's a fantastically growing market
and if done if done right if designed and developed
with behavioral science you know in mind You
can develop schemes that can actually really
help reduce risk. And that's beneficial to the
insurance company. It's beneficial to you. It's
beneficial to the people that are driving around
you and your community. And ultimately, it hasn't
actually required really politicians to do anything
at that point. But if you align it with other
things that politicians and policy could do.
then you can help people to become safer drivers
or help people to become better drivers. I don't
expect people to drive around thinking of safety.
Nobody does, right? We just drive. And so you
have to be realistic about it. I think of it
in terms of safety. You probably think of it
in terms of safety because you're well aware
of the impact, like you do. I also get really
annoyed when I see people driving in a way that
puts others at risk. And so, you know, but we
think about it in a different way to most people
who are literally just getting in a car to go
from A to B. And that's it. But you have to have
ways of being able to engage them and without
always having to be the authority that is doing
so. I think getting to, you know, what we talked
about with your dad as well, the insurance premiums,
I don't know if it's the same in the UK, but
in America now, the driving insurance premiums
are insane. I mean, I forget. It's close to $10
,000 a year now for us. And we've got three cars.
So my wife and I obviously have been driving
for a long time. My son is 18, so he's more expensive.
But think about that. That's the price of a car
every year to insure a car, which again, I'm
touching wood again, we haven't had any accidents.
So that's zero claims as well. For me, since
I was 17, I'm 51 now. No benefit there whatsoever.
I'm still just getting gouged. But I would imagine
that if we made a massive difference on the number
of accidents on the road, then insurance payments
would fall. Well, the ridiculous thing is that
the auto insurance industry isn't really making
any money on this either. So you feel like you're
paying a ridiculous amount. They are paying so
much in outgoings. that they're not making much
profit from this either. So nobody is actually
winning in this market right now. Do you know
what I mean? It's really not suitable. And that's
where I think the market right now is primed
for something to change. Something needs to change.
And that's probably where telematics type policies
will come in because you will get to a point
where it makes sense for someone to say, Yeah,
I'll have a telematics policy because it's cheaper.
And if I, you know, if I follow along with how
it, you know, it measures my driving and I can
actually earn rewards and actually I can become
a better, well, I quite like this. Now I can
see how I perform compared to other people, you
know, and it becomes something people want to
do and it saves them money. All of a sudden you've
developed a very strong market and reason for
doing this. And if you've got that type of data,
insurance companies can price you more accurately
than just based on, you know, your background,
your zip code and your age and your occupation.
So it makes much more sense to be, you know,
these data are available. The cars are developing
the data now. So it makes perfect sense for us
to be using this to manage risk better. One of
the other... You know, big role. Absolutely.
One of the problems we have in America, and I'm
sure you've been exposed to this, is the frivolous
lawsuits too. We have billboards on the motorways
saying, hey, I got $6 million this year. And
it's almost like encouraging some people to get
into an accident. Maybe that'll be taken care
of the rest of my life. It's like winning the
lottery. And there is obviously a time and a
place when someone through no fault of their
own has had their life changed. And yes, that's
where lawsuits have an application. But again,
our profession is well aware of these five mile
an hour backing accidents where the person now
is supposedly paralyzed. And I've had it in the
moment. They're on the phone to the lawyer in
the ambulance on the way to the hospital. So
that is something I think we need to change in
America, which I think would make a big dent
on these premiums too. Oh, it definitely would.
I mean, yeah, that's been one of the crippling
things in the US for the auto insurance market
is the rise in those claims and the amount that
they're having to pay out. So some of them, you
know, they're sort of called nuclear claims because
they just absolutely blow a company's budget
out for the year when one of these goes off.
But it brings you back to this, you know, the
young driver issue, that if you have someone,
you know, if you've got a car full of four young
people, you know, late teens, early 20s, they've
got a lifetime of potentially living with a serious
injury or the result of a crash that, you know,
insurance companies have to pick up. And so,
of course, improving the risk on the road and
reducing it. is beneficial to everyone in the
whole place. And so it does feel to me like we're
on the cusp of things have to change. This just
can't continue. I'm not quite sure what the spark
is going to be that really ignites it, though.
But I'm certainly not in the US right now where
there's a feeling of a strong culture of freedoms
and independence. Driving is seen as one of those,
it's my right, not necessarily a responsibility.
Yeah. And again, civilian versus citizen. Yeah.
You mentioned earlier about the interesting statistics
in the military. I had a sleep researcher from
the army here in the US, Alison Brageron, and
she was talking about the numerous fatalities
they had from the cadre. in special forces selection
driving home from fort bragg and you know coming
off the side of a mountain for example sleep
deprivation is is a you know thing near and dear
to my heart because the fire service in america
we're so through refusing to change the things
that need to be changed they're so overworked
and understaffed now At the basal basic week,
they're working 56. That's three 24 -hour shifts
with no sleep. But now, because of the recruitment
crisis, they're being forced to work extra shifts.
So now you've got people behind the wheel that
have worked 80 hours, 90, 100 hours, not slept
four times that week, 48 hours, 72 hours at a
time, which is pure insanity to me. So that's
something that I'm working on, being a voice
to... get back to a healthy work week and reverse
the recruitment and retention crisis. But circling
back to your comment, talk to me then about the
issues that you were seeing in the military.
And then let's kind of talk if there's any area
you wanted to discuss about sleep and driving
safety. I mean, first that's, yeah, I can see
how that would be very concerning from your perspective
and from your colleagues of working in that environment.
I mean, it's just clear any time you look at
research in any industry that when you push people
to their limits in terms of the time on task
and then just the length of time, you know, not
just on task, but being engaged in something
or repeating a behavior, that the ability to
perform it well, you know, diminishes. And so
it doesn't sound like a... a feasible thing to
continue without what will end up being the loss
of something um somewhere and whether that you
know be in an instant that you're attending or
whether that be you know decision making is always
going to be impacted in these situations ultimately
uh and that's that's the issue that when we get
fatigued we make worse poorer decisions and there's
no way around that and i imagine in Well, in
safety -critical industries like yours, a decision
can be life or death for you or a colleague,
and you're having to make decisions under extreme
pressure and timelines. So, yeah, that would
be very concerning. Going back to your question
about, yeah, in terms of the military side, yeah,
I was just staggered that... At the time, the
biggest loss of life in the military was basically
called accidental death. And when you delve into
that, the majority of those accidental deaths
are road crashes. And they were outweighing loss
in service fatalities. You know, suicide is always
the other big one that's up there alongside road
safety. But it just seemed something that was
bizarre. Again, you don't think about it until
you look at it. And I'm pretty sure none of these
service people think about when they finish their
shift. It is not in their mind that that drive
home is probably as much risk as being in a combat
zone for them. It won't be seen that way. All
they're thinking is, I want to get home. I'm
so desperate to get home. And so, again, it's
about how do you manage that risk? And the management
of that risk then comes down onto the defence.
operators the people that are responsible for
their well -being um but that as always you then
hit these issues of they're like well these guys
have just been on you know out in whatever country
serving for so many months we've just flown them
in all they want to do is go home if we tell
them they need to go and spend the night in the
barracks they're not going to be happy And you're
like, okay, I can totally get that. But if you
know they're at risk, is that not the better
thing to do? And actually, what you find when
you put in policies that are initially people
don't like, you think people just adapt. And
over time, it just becomes the norm. So then
becomes the norm that, okay, I'm going to arrive
back from duty. We've got one night in the barracks.
Let's get a good sleep. Then I'm going home.
And it becomes the norm. And I always refer to
the smoking ban in the UK that came in. And,
well, you'll recall growing up and going into
bars full of smoke, as I did, and that was the
common thing. And smoking in a bar was seen as
almost a right. as, you know, it was part of
life. And when they touted the smoking ban, people
were saying, this is never going to work. How
are you going to police that? You're going to
have police going into every bar, checking that
someone's not smoking. It's never going to happen.
They brought it in and people don't smoke in
bars. Bars just made a little area out of the
back where they could go and smoke, sheltered
area. And people go out there and do it. And
you don't see any police in bars charging someone
for lighting up. It's just now not a done thing.
we just adapt to this, you know, and it's not
a big issue, but it's probably had a massive
impact on health outcomes. No, 100%. I know,
I mean, the younger generations now, I mean,
vaping, I think, is the one concern, but as far
as smoking and alcohol, I mean, they participate
in both of those a fraction of the amount that
the rest of us do. So that's, again, it shows
if you, you know, if you educate, and set those
parameters and are humble enough as someone who's
an older generation to say, yeah, like I tell
my son all the time, I drink and I'm like, yeah,
but honestly, it tastes horrible and it does
nothing for you. I'm still working on trying
to completely eliminate it from my life, but
my son doesn't drink at all. He's 18. So again,
obviously too young air quotes in America, but
old enough in the UK. And then my bonus boy,
my stepson is now 24. And he'll have a drink
once in a blue moon. Now, when I was 17, 18,
19, my mates were at the pub Friday and Saturday
religiously. So, yeah, it's amazing. There's
a phrase, plant the seed of a tree under which
the shade you'll never know. And I love that.
Going back to that culture again of doing something.
that it may not benefit you, but doing it because
it's the right thing to do, whether it's on the
road or whether we were talking about smoking,
because the anti -smoking warriors that fought
tooth and nail when I was a kid, I mean, we're
benefiting from it now. I mean, that's one of
the most incredible things I think of modern
society was eliminating tobacco because there
was no question of the health ill effects, despite
some of the research saying, oh, cigarettes are
fine. funded by the cigarette companies. We all
know now the truth. So who knows how many millions
of lives those people saved. Massively. But it
takes decades for that type of thing to happen.
Culture shifts don't happen quickly. In fact,
well, I say that. COVID was probably a unique
example of what happens if you suddenly change
a lot of things. and you will get a behavioral
shift. But it was for a short period of time.
And as you say, then you pull it all away and
people went back to their day -to -day lives.
But it showed you the impact that policies can
have in shaping behavior. And all of a sudden,
like standing two meters away from someone in
a queue became the norm. Using anti -bag hand
wash was the way for everyone, et cetera, and
wearing masks. But what we sort of learned was
protect yourself and your community and those
around you and protect older members of your
family and things like that. You had to start
thinking about what really mattered. And I think
that you saw... you saw a level of community
possibly not seen in other ways. I think I've
digressed from the precise point you were making,
but yeah, there's some really interesting work
by a guy I work closely with, Jonathan Asani
at Johns Hopkins. I mention him deliberately
because he's a great guy and he's looked at sort
of, mindfulness in driving and um and sense of
purpose and and in in one study of sort of teens
i think so 16 to 19 he was like nationally representative
in the us and he he found that young people that
had a a sense of purpose an altruistic sense
of purpose so as a care for like people around
them their family or or others were safer drivers
and and it just shone a light on and this was
mediated by actually a bit of mindfulness in
driving so you know an awareness and paying attention
to what you were doing like deliberately and
paying attention to those around you uh it sort
of mediated this and ultimately it shone a light
on the importance of us having you know why are
you doing this what what is your purpose and
it made me think about it um that's very easy
when you've got two two young kids but um it's
yeah you know i think for for young people it
can be really hard to know what your sense of
purpose is you don't think about that um probably
until asked in a questionnaire written by a psychologist
you know um But it highlights how important that
is. And if you don't have a sense of purpose,
then you probably just don't care. And you're
going to look out for yourself. You're going
to be more self -sensed. And actually, those
that did have a really strong sense of purpose
were a bit more self -oriented. So they were
probably really driven to achieve for themselves,
but not necessarily caring about those around
them. They actually had a higher risk profile.
You know, you can start to see how someone's
personality starts to feed into what underpins
some of their driving behaviors that would put
them more at risk or not. And so going back to
the start, driving is really simple in one way,
but it's exceptionally complex in another. Absolutely.
I want to hit one more area, then we'll go to
some closing questions. But obviously, this is
I'm sure what all the people are thinking about
when they're listening. The smartphones these
days, when I hear a lot of psychologists talking
about mental health in children, smartphones
and social media is always one of the things
they talk about. When I think of driving, the
tendency is to think, well, these young kids
are on their phones in the cars. I'd have to
be completely honest. Most of the people I see
messing with phones while they're driving are
actually. 30 40 year olds so i'm not even going
to put the young people i'm sure there are some
doing it too but it's the adults it's the older
people that i see you know so talk to me about
that distraction very new in the world of driving
um but i mean as as a as a first responder it
seems like the duis are going down but the distracted
driving through cell phones are really causing
a lot of issues now yeah i think that's probably
uh a reasonable uh sort of take on the situation
um look it's it's a huge distractor in the vehicle
but it's a huge distractor in life but you know
even if you're having a sitting in a cafe having
a conversation with someone if their phone beeps
their attention is taken to the phone and away
from you even in that one -to -one personal situation
so there's no difference in a car where the the
phone If it is, you know, if it's engaged or
in vision and something happens, like you get
a notification, your attention will be drawn
to it. And the desire to know what that notification
is, is strong. And that is then just pulling
you away from attending to the road and what's
around you and the task you should be prioritizing.
And the priority becomes something else. And
so it's very easy to understand the mechanisms
of how mobile phones drag our attention away
from what we should be doing. And it's a very
difficult one because this was never really managed
at the start when mobile phones were emerging,
that there were no standards in place on how
vehicles should integrate with them. what should
be what behavior should be allowed and what doesn't
um but all the receipt all the research was very
quickly demonstrating that if you are on your
phone you know if you're texting really bad because
you are having to take your eyes off the road
a lot to create that text if you are holding
your phone and speaking It's pretty bad. You've
got a manual and an auditory distraction. And
even if you're speaking hands -free, there's
a distraction effect because it goes back to
what we talked about at the start. You are trying
to take in a flow of information in front of
you about your environment at a pace that's ridiculous.
And your system is trying to process that. You
then add in another task, like listening to a
conversation or speaking. to the speaker in the
car and listen to someone on that conversation.
You're just adding more demand on your brain.
And we're pretty limited when it comes that way.
We're very impressive as humans, but we're limited
in our capacity to manage information at any
one time. And so two things happen. Your performance
of driving the vehicle reduces and you become
worse at that. You don't control the vehicle
as well. Your distance to people changes and
your speed is more variable. So we know your
performances, but also your performance on the
call is bad. That gets affected. So I ran simulator
studies and we asked people to listen to a shopping
list and then repeat it back. And they can hardly
remember the things on the list because they
just can't process all the information at the
same time. And people often say, well, surely
speaking hands -free is just the same as speaking
to a passenger. But it's not the case. And the
reason it's not the case is something really
subtle. And next time you're in the car with
a passenger and you're talking to them, watch
how their cadence changes as you approach demanding
situations, right? If you get to a junction,
They will stop talking. If they're talking, they
will stop. When you're at a point where you're
making a decision about pulling out into traffic,
they'll naturally just slow down or stop talking
and give you a moment to attend to that high
demand situation. Then they'll pick up the conversation
again and carry on. On the phone, obviously,
someone can't see what you see. And so they just
continue talking. You could be having a conversation.
a sales conversation you could be having a conversation
with your boss who knows it could be quite important
or it could be an emotive comment you could be
having an argument with with someone or whatever
it could be highly emotive and they don't know
you're in a high demand situation already and
your brain can't just cope with this and you
make it's the same as the sleep deprivation you
make a poor decision anything that either distracts
us or you know affects or impairs us is just
influencing that innate ability to make a good
decision your biasing stops working you're not
seeing things in the environment you're not identifying
them in advance you're not anticipating and there
was a cracking little study that showed that
someone like in the equivalent of speaking on
the phone in the car their ability to spot hazards
is the same as a novice driver so all of that
benefit of experience you've got to identify
hazards in advance As soon as you're speaking
on the phone, your ability becomes the same as
a novice driver. So you lose all of that because
you're distracted. And that's what ends up causing
us to, I guess, increase risk again when we're
on the phone. That's amazing to hear. It does
make so much sense. You're talking about that
one person being disconnected from the situation
versus a passenger. It's funny because I... Think
about the comedians talking about having to turn
the radio down when you're lost and you're looking
for certain streets. And now you've just given
us a psychology behind it. You need to have that
brain quiet so you can focus on where you're
going. But that always seemed such a laughable
thing that at the moment you're focusing, you
turn the stereo down. But now I understand the
reason behind it. Yeah, it's exactly that. All
right, well, I want to go to some closing questions
before I let you go. The first one I love to
ask, is there a book or are there books that
you love to recommend? It can be related to our
discussion today or completely unrelated. My
go -to, and it is completely unrelated, I'm afraid.
My go -to, the book that I read and it just really
impacted on me. was Nelson Mandela's Long Walk
to Freedom. I just think it's a story of just
an incredible person that put so much into their
life. I always think when I feel overwhelmed
and tired with the work I'm doing, it's nothing
compared to the amount of work he was putting
in at the time. when he was trying to fight a
regime and help people in his community and be
a lawyer at the same time and things like that.
And then deal with the adversity that he did
and how he managed the complex nature of what
was involved. But then I think it was the future
aspect of... How he managed the not holding a
grudge when he had the opportunity for power
and to actually try and bring a country together.
So many great aspects for you to learn from and
think about. I think a lot of nations really
need to kind of refine what a real leader looks
like. I think we've lost our way in some of these
areas. I'll just leave it there. What about film,
television, documentaries? That's also a good
one. Let's see. So I remember, I mean, I'm not
sure how popular this guy is these days, but,
you know, you had... Michael Moore's documentaries
early in his career, like Flint, Michigan and
stuff like that, which just at the time I was
going through uni were, I thought were a different
type of journalism to what you'd typically seen.
You know, there's the film, I can't remember
the name of it, but... about the plastics and...
I'm losing it. I can't think of the term, but
the plastics in all of our everyday equipment
and our Teflon pans and stuff like that and on
our carpets and all this sort of thing. I can't
remember the name of that film. Is that what
I mean? Dark Waters. I had the guy that was written
about, Rob Ballot, the real lawyer on the show.
That stuff is in our firefighter gear. So it's
a big buzz topic at the moment. Yeah, that was
a film that you're watching and then as you're
watching it, you're looking around and you're
going, ah, okay. I thought that was quite impactful
as well. I like that. There is a company I've
been working with, now I say working, I've had
them on the show and been, you know, helping
them as far as a fireside, but they're called
Cambiotics. They are developing a probiotic that
removes PFAS from the body, which hopefully later
this year, they're actually going to be able
to release. So that is encouraging because obviously
being aware of what we're exposed to and trying
to reduce that, like you said, nonstick pans
and, you know, the sprays, the waterproofing
sprays and some of these things, if we can. get
those out of our home, but then also try and
get some of these forever chemicals out of our
body, then, you know, put some optimism in at
least. That's, that's a very fascinating development.
Yeah. Yeah. Do that. Absolutely. All right. Well,
the next question, is there a person you'd recommend
to come on this podcast as a guest to speak to
the first responders, military and associated
professions of the world? Well, I, I name -dropped
my friend and colleague Jonathan Isani at Johns
Hopkins. And I think your audience would love
to hear from him. He's fantastic and has a very
fresh approach to thinking about things. You'd
probably have a lot of road safety element to
it, but he's... He's got a really great mindset
and way of thinking about things and mindfulness
as well. So I think your audience would enjoy
that. Yeah, absolutely. And if you're able to
help me connect, I'd love to get him on. Will
do. Thank you so much. All right. Well, then
the last question before we make sure everyone
knows where to find you, what do you do to decompress?
So I'd love to say I get to go and... I play
golf these days. I think that's probably my enjoyment
space where I can just get away and not think
about everything else that's going on in life
and do that with friends. So I really do enjoy
a game of golf. And I see that as the type of
sport I can take into my older age as the more
physical stuff reduces. The other cheesy answer
is just I love spending time with my kids. It
just refreshes your mind, challenges you every
day, and keeps you on your toes. I don't think
it's cheesy at all. I mean, what I talk about
with the fire service when we're in this crisis
at the moment, because obviously money is dangled
in front of their faces as far as overtime premiums
and things, but there is no greater currency
than time with your children. So I couldn't agree
more. I mean, that's how I decompress too. And
my dog, she's pretty cool. Yeah. All right. Well,
if people listening want to learn more about
you, want to reach out to you, where are the
best places online? Your easiest is probably
on LinkedIn to connect, drop me a message. I'm
happy to share email address and meet people
that way. Yeah, I've gone from working at a large
transport research organisation for many years
to joining a start -up in the insurance world
and trying to manage risk on the roads in telematics.
And then it was acquired by Aon, so going into
a large global organisation for a while. And
then now I work independently. Just a consultant
that works for myself and with a lot of clients
around the world from Australia to a lot in the
US as well and in the UK. And I work with governments
and private organizations to try and improve
things. Brilliant. Well, I want to thank you
so much. It's been such an interesting conversation,
especially coming from the world of psychology.
I mean, as you alluded to, like every moving
vehicle, pretty much aside from drones and some
of these Teslas, you know, has a human being
in it. So there's been, you know, so much insight.
I've learned so much when it comes to this safety
issue. And I hope that this can be one of many
conversations that finally, you know, is a critical
mass. make change around the world. So I want
to thank you so much for being so generous with
your time and coming on the Behind the Shield
podcast today. Delighted to. Thank you, James.
Really appreciate it.