IRSE Exam Forum

How do all the 'powers that be' governement, HMRI etc, work out the 'cost per life,' when we are talking about approvals of installations for example ATP, AWS etc?

(28-07-2010 04:54 PM)Archie Wrote: [ -> ]How do all the 'powers that be' governement, HMRI etc, work out the 'cost per life,' when we are talking about approvals of installations for example ATP, AWS etc?

Have a look at research projects T430 and T616 from RSSB.

(28-07-2010 04:54 PM)Archie Wrote: [ -> ]How do all the 'powers that be' governement, HMRI etc, work out the 'cost per life,' when we are talking about approvals of installations for example ATP, AWS etc?

Very good question; I don't think there is an easy answer. I think "cost per life" is a bit emotive, but fundamentally there is only so much money to spend and there does seem to be some metric.

Take a smaller example re how you control risks in your own domestic environment. Do you have a smoke detector, do you have one in every room in your house or are you selective where you place? Their capital cost is not a lot and their running costs are also quite modest; how do you justify your decision not to have at least a couple (for diversity) in each room of your house?
Then what about a carbon monoxide detectors; they are more expensive in first cost and in keeping in effective service. How many have you decided to provide for your family, where and why?
How many fire extinguishers have you got and where are they located?
So it is much the same decision- what level of provision is reckless, what level is reasonable and what level is totally excessive for the risk? It is the law of diminishing returns. You can always achieve more safety if you can bear the costs, not only financial but also the various other disadvantages that they bring. Stairs are very convenient but also very dangerouys as people fall down them and do themselves serious injury and can be killed. A properly installed and maintained lift is safer and therefore logically perhaps stairs should be reserved for emergency use only. How many people decide to sacrifice a fair percentage of their living accomodation as well as the significant financial outlay to install in their own home?

Basically I don't know the answer to your question and I don't know how anyone does. There is only a certain amount of wealth and we have to decide the best way of spending it. We talk about "Value of Prevented Fatality" but of course death is only something we postpone- we can't prevent. Even if the medical specialists could find a miracle cure to cancer or heart disease and "save" countless deaths, these very people would all die eventually from something else.

Is a "life" of a 5 year old worth more or less than someone who is 25, 45, 65 or 85?
If being callous, one would have to say that the 25 year old must be worth the most as almost all of society's "investment" has been expended with very little "return" having been achieved yet but with good prospects. The 5 year old has not cost too much yet, the 65 year old has little remaining "pay back time" and by the time you get to 85 then financially you are statistically "uneconomic" - however would we really want to live in a society that was quite so financially focussed on the bottom line?

I am a rather a cynic and believe you can prove anything with statistics when calculating the "cost" or "worth" of anything. Think of the terrific size pensions that some high fliers think they are worth for what they have done for their companies, be it RBS or BP; then compare that to the wages that many hard working talented people earn in a year....

I'd be interested to see if others can help Alfie here but I am struggling other than say that we are only prepared to pay x% of our Gross National Product on improving safety because we have other things on which we need to spend money, have set a target of preventing y% of "avoidable" deaths and that equates to

[quote='PJW' pid='1855' dateline='1280344780']
I'd be interested to see if others can help Alfie here but I am struggling other than say that we are only prepared to pay x% of our Gross National Product on improving safety because we have other things on which we need to spend money, have set a target of preventing y% of "avoidable" deaths and that equates to

(28-07-2010 08:19 PM)PJW Wrote: [ -> ][quote='Archie' pid='1853' dateline='1280332475']
How do all the 'powers that be' governement, HMRI etc, work out the 'cost per life,' when we are talking about approvals of installations for example ATP, AWS etc?

Very good question; I don't think there is an easy answer. I think "cost per life" is a bit emotive, but fundamentally there is only so much money to spend and there does seem to be some metric.

Take a smaller example re how you control risks in your own domestic environment. Do you have a smoke detector, do you have one in every room in your house or are you selective where you place? Their capital cost is not a lot and their running costs are also quite modest; how do you justify your decision not to have at least a couple (for diversity) in each room of your house?
Then what about a carbon monoxide detectors; they are more expensive in first cost and in keeping in effective service. How many have you decided to provide for your family, where and why?
How many fire extinguishers have you got and where are they located?
So it is much the same decision- what level of provision is reckless, what level is reasonable and what level is totally excessive for the risk? It is the law of diminishing returns. You can always achieve more safety if you can bear the costs, not only financial but also the various other disadvantages that they bring. Stairs are very convenient but also very dangerouys as people fall down them and do themselves serious injury and can be killed. A properly installed and maintained lift is safer and therefore logically perhaps stairs should be reserved for emergency use only. How many people decide to sacrifice a fair percentage of their living accomodation as well as the significant financial outlay to install in their own home?

Basically I don't know the answer to your question and I don't know how anyone does. There is only a certain amount of wealth and we have to decide the best way of spending it. We talk about "Value of Prevented Fatality" but of course death is only something we postpone- we can't prevent. Even if the medical specialists could find a miracle cure to cancer or heart disease and "save" countless deaths, these very people would all die eventually from something else.

Is a "life" of a 5 year old worth more or less than someone who is 25, 45, 65 or 85?
If being callous, one would have to say that the 25 year old must be worth the most as almost all of society's "investment" has been expended with very little "return" having been achieved yet but with good prospects. The 5 year old has not cost too much yet, the 65 year old has little remaining "pay back time" and by the time you get to 85 then financially you are statistically "uneconomic" - however would we really want to live in a society that was quite so financially focussed on the bottom line?

I am a rather a cynic and believe you can prove anything with statistics when calculating the "cost" or "worth" of anything. Think of the terrific size pensions that some high fliers think they are worth for what they have done for their companies, be it RBS or BP; then compare that to the wages that many hard working talented people earn in a year....

I'd be interested to see if others can help Alfie here but I am struggling other than say that we are only prepared to pay x% of our Gross National Product on improving safety because we have other things on which we need to spend money, have set a target of preventing y% of "avoidable" deaths and that equates to

(28-07-2010 09:05 PM)Peter Wrote: [ -> ]I think you have summed up what RSSB paid the experts to research - that it is not a precise science, there are lots of arguments about relative worth / sensible weighting for different categories / what actual costs should and should not be included.

I hadn't read nor did I even know of the existance of these reports. Perhaps the money spent on those reports would have been better spent on some actual safety improvement; perhaps I am in the wrong job......

Fundementally, there is an accepted figure of what the expected financial loss is per life which can be used as an initial reference point to "justify" value in applying a solution to a problem. The figure has slipped upwards of recent times and it should be remembered that it is an averaged cost per casualty and not everyone dies.

However, politics and social pressure can alter what value is given to a cost for a life. Technically, the ALARP arguement for TPWS is not valid but following the two Paddington crashes (and to divert attention away from ATP one might suggest), TPWS was successfully deployed network wide at a very significant cost. It has reduced the SPAD count and the possible concequences for those SPADs that have occured. Therefore, Joe Public's mind has been greatly appeased but the appeasement has mostly been via a lack of media understanding and 'something' having been done to 'solve' the 'problem'!

Would the funds have been better employed on ATP? Possibly but there are also problems with ATP as employed on NR (but that is another story/thread).

Jerry