The hit-and-run accident involving a traffic policemen on Tuesday reflected the lack of adequate control over road safety over many years, a group called Doctors for Road Safety said in a hard-hitting statement on Thursday.

“This is evidenced by the worsening fatal, grievous and non-grievous road traffic accident records. Further to this evidence, the daily experience of decent road users who observe road traffic regulations is that other road users who decide to break the rules, are doing so with impunity,” D4RS said.

“This same case is a classic example, amongst others documented, that the system has failed to pick up and prevent this incident by a previous offender,” it added, referring to the 17-year-old charged with the attempted murder of officer Simon Schembri.

Expressing solidarity with the victim and his family, the group called on the authorities to strongly gear up the action and strengthen control of Maltese roads “to give peace of mind to all road users by adopting a zero tolerance approach towards road safety and aim towards a zero fatality rate as envisioned by D4RS”.

The National Statistics Office reported that there were 14,940 accidents in 2017, slightly down from 15,017 in 2016. However, the number of injuries increased by 8.3 per cent to 405 over the same period in 2016.

There were 19 fatalities in 2017.