Black boxes should help save lives - not just insurance costs

While efforts to bring down the cost of cover for young drivers and the number of accidents they suffer are very welcome, there are worrying indications that insurers and the police will not make the most of 'black box' technology to improve driver safety.

In Ireland, Axa has been testing a GPS gadget called Traksure, which continuously checks a car's speed and location, then compares that data with the local speed limit. Those driving within the speed limits are rewarded with lower premiums. But those who break the speed limit frequently in any one month receive a warning letter. Three letters and your premium goes up. However, Axa promised policyholders that this information would not be passed on to police unless legally required.

This raises a whole host of questions about morality. Such offenders are, after all, breaking the law and endangering people's lives.

Norwich Union, which has been testing black boxes in Britain, says that it is legally obliged to produce information if the police produce a warrant relating to an accident. However, although the insurer installed 5,000 boxes during its pilot, it only handed over information to the police once, and then at the request of the policyholder who had been involved in a fatal accident.

A spokesman for the insurer says the information it collects enables the insurer to work out how fast the car is going. But he adds: 'From an insurance aspect we're not interested.'

If the police wanted to have access to black-box information relating to speed, he says, they would need to go to court already armed with evidence of speeding, which negates the need for the black-box information. 'We don't want people to be involved in accidents, and speeding can contribute to that. But the more important factors to us are the type of road and the time of day you drive,' he says.

The government has other ideas. It has run a pilot with Leeds University testing a GPS system, the Intelligent Speed Adaption, which actually prevents cars going over the speed limit. Transport for London hopes to run a similar test in the capital.

While this Big Brother solution might sound the ideal way to stop speeding, Edmund King of the RAC Foundation says there has been some evidence that drivers pay less attention and break rules such as jumping amber lights if they feel their car is being 'controlled'. It therefore makes more sense to leave the driver fully in control, but knowing they will be reported if they repeatedly speed.

No doubt insurers are keen not to put people off the idea of buying insurance based on black-box technology. But it's hard to imagine one letting a policyholder off the hook if he is found to have committed insurance fraud. If an insurer sees evidence of someone breaking the law in a way that can cost lives, surely it is in all our interests for them to hand that information to the police?