The Department for Transport’s publication Reported road casualties Great Britain, final results: 2025, shows a 19% increase in the number of people killed or seriously injured (KSI) for 2025 due to tyre-related factors. These numbers represent people with families, jobs and lives that have ended or changed significantly.
- 2024 tyre-related KSI casualties: 169
- 2025 tyre-related KSI casualties: 201
Looking back over the last five years the average number of people who have been killed or seriously injured due to illegal, defective or underinflated tyres increased from 150 to 163 which is a worrying upward trend.
The number of total casualties due to tyre-related issues also rose year on year from 585 in 2024 to 667 in 2025, a 14% increase.
Car drivers were those most often involved but the number of motorcyclists affected also rose.
These numbers remain far too high, and we know that tyre defects are avoidable.
What can be done?
- Tyre retailers need to share these sobering statistics with their customers.
- MOT advisories on tyres need to be taken more seriously, with effective follow-up.
- Make tyre safety a formal road safety performance indicator
- Increase roadside tyre checks and enforcement
- Introduce escalating interventions for drivers or operators repeatedly found with illegal tyres.
- Strengthen public awareness campaigns focussing on the same message
- Add tyre safety checks to learner-driver education, test materials, post-test messaging and used-car purchase guidance.
- Encourage free tyre checks to drive behaviour change.
- Ensure collision investigators and reporting officers record tyre defects consistently, so the scale of the problem is better understood.