A respite in a year 2009 drama with a 17

On October 29, days of a weekend of Saints that it fears deadly, highway safety re-broadcasts the two films of 30 seconds, realistic and brutal of the campaign "Just", signed in 2007 by the Agency Lowe Stratéus: "you spend just Orange, you are just dead.". Two spotsplébiscités during their first broadcast by the public, which should be taken up in television until 18 November. And a break with the previous campaign of communication (press and display) aired last June, baptized "Lives saved". Congratulating the 12,000 dead avoided on the road, she employed a smiling and relaxed tone that it had not been heard for years: "Michel resumed pasta", "Amel is of bubbles..."

The choice of highlight a campaign "lasts", taken for a long time according to the Agency, is paying: with 26 killed against 40 in 2008, the weekend of the all saints will prove less deadly than expected. A respite in a year 2009 drama, with a 17.7 increase in the number of deaths on the road in September (or 393 killed), following a very bad month of June. Michèle interdepartmental Merli, delegated to road safety, takes care of nuance: "interim mortality figures in 2009 are indeed disturbing, but the year is not over."However, if the trend persists, the Secretary of State for transport, Dominique Bussereau, could announce 4,400 deaths for 2009 against 4.275 died in 2008. In short, after seven years of continuous decline of road mortality, a nasty turn associations attribute to the lack of mobilization of the Government. The controversy takes place on background of rivalry between the departments of ecology and the Interior to supervise the issue. Brice Hortefeux is indeed visible signs of its ambition to retrieve the full responsibility for road safety. A particularly sensitive, delicate folder... and political.

1999: shock Depardon

For ten years, avoir, road safety communication seemed avoir triggered a virtuous circle. With the CAF Agency!, Director Raymond Depardon takes the first, in 1999. The film begins with a cheerful song, "Highway fleurie", of Charles Trenet, on bottom of campaign landscape, dominated by a sky blue and soft... At a shade close: on the road allowances of the road, in cars and on grass, the viewer discovers smashed bodies. A logic for this 30-second spot, reminiscent of the poem by Rimbaud, "The sleeper of the val" seem to sleep while he has "two red holes on the right side. Deceptive appearances, morbid reality.

Depardon film marks a sharp shift in the communication of road safety, which preferred to icides Council campaigns, of the type "Fasten your seat belt" or "drive slowly". And, while since the 1980s, the United Kingdom and the Scandinavian countries do not hesitate to challenge the viewer with violent, disturbing spots. Death appears quite regularly, army of a scythe, on national roads. In France, on the other hand, it feared "the rejection" that were in danger of susciterde such campaigns... "Ten years after, they are arguments continued to oppose, indicates Benoît De Laurens, Director General of the Agency Lowe Stratéus (Interpublic), responsible for road safety budget since 2001. "And we regularly answer:"the violence that we show in our movies is never as strong as the reality".".A road safety, Michele Merli said: "There is no rules on the hard or soft campaigns dimension." There is a behavior change goals to achieve.

Long, the automobile is synonymous with speed, freedom and insolent transgression. Death as the price of recklessness, tinged to some form of elegance and abandon, Sagan or Nimier manner. The car as inevitable accident. The French then evolve in a happy denial: "when we organize qualitative groups, it was just in the anything, remembers Benoît of Laurens. Drivers showed a great indulgence towards mistakes. They felt that they were unlikely to be punished for offences and felt generally that the accident was the fault of the other...

Communication and sanctions

In 1999, beliefs switch. Too many dead. Too much mess. The concept of fate "is" more. Place shock images. This is a success, the public plebiscite Depardon campaign. At the same time, the Government Toughens rules and sanctions with the multiplication of automatic radar, the lowering of the threshold of blood alcohol content of 0.8 g 0.5 g, the probationary licence... And the 2002 campaign, showing faces or bodies following the contours of the crushed metal, WINS time display Grand Prix and Grand Prix "strategies." In the first half of 2003, the Government claimed a 25 drop of the killed dead on the road, with a figure of 5.318 death.

Why then has the current skid A set of factors, non-obvious with each other: weather in September and October which gave the French the temptation to return to their car. Possible relaxation of attention with the announcement of a continued fall in the mortality on the road. Finally, there are used, different strategies depending on the country. In the United States and Britain, communication campaigns are designed for particularly vulnerable microcibles: military leaving every night their barracks in moto, youth and ethnic minorities particularly reckless... More creations, more financial and technical, but which offer the advantage of not "watering" undifferentiated way of very eclectic targets, the mother exhausted to the biker sneaking between cars on the device.

"Overall, adds Benoît De Laurens, we have managed to"refuel"reasonable population: the belt at the front port has become a reflex, as not drinking before driving." But on the other hand remains a hard core of drivers which address and that we call the offenders who exceed limit. "These transgress any knowing and could be between 10 and 15 of drivers. How to convince the rider who sefait pleasure in excess of 200 km/h Or still young, highly alcoholic, who accompanies back to 4 o'clock in the morning his friends on small roads There is no doubt, one of the toughest challenges of road safety.

Find a selection of French and foreign spots for road safety on