Honda cops a serve over safety cuts

0 0 September 12, 2024 Edit this post

Honda has copped a serve for cutting back on the level of safety gear fitted to Australian-delivered cars.

ANCAP, the organisation charged with testing the safety of new vehicles here revealed there are subtle differences between Honda models destined for the European market and those offered in Australia.

While the hybrid Civic has been awarded a full five stars for safety based on European test results, ANCAP says it will need to re-test the petrol version of the car before it can determine a rating.

This is because petrol-only models miss out on such things as a centre airbag, side thorax bags for rear seat passengers, speed sign recognition and intelligent speed limiter systems, plus intelligent seatbelt reminders for rear seating positions.

Honda's CR-V and ZR-V SUVs have also come under scrutiny.

CR-V is sold here with a less sophisticated suite of active collision avoidance features (ADAS), putting CR-V’s Safety Assist score beneath the five-star threshold at 68 per cent.

In Europe, it is offered with an optional ‘safety pack’ that enables the car to achieve a five-star rating, but the pack is not even an option here.

Those cars without the safety pack score four out of five stars for safety.

A four-star rating for the smaller ZR-V has also been confirmed because our vehicles are structurally different to their European siblings.

A different front bumper beam is fitted which affects test performance in some test impact locations.

European vehicles are also built with an additional beam in the rear doors which is omitted from Australian-sold vehicles.

ANCAP and Euro NCAP took steps in 2018 to align test and rating criteria, to encourage uniformity across markets and to make it easier for manufacturers to build the same levels of safety into vehicles destined for Australia or Europe.

This alignment enables ANCAP to leverage safety performance results from European testing, allowing it to publish independent safety ratings for a much larger number of vehicles each year – benefiting Australian and New Zealand consumers.

Each of the European test results and the specification of vehicles actually supplied in Australia and New Zealand are closely scrutinised by ANCAP to ensure they are relevant and applicable to our market.

ANCAP's Carla Hoorweg said manufacturers are consciously providing Australian and New Zealand consumers with products that do not match the same levels of safety provided to European consumers, and no doubt consumers will be surprised to learn of these differences.

“We are seeing some manufacturers prioritise higher levels of safety only in markets where the regulation requires it," she said.

"While others are offering different safety specifications based on the expectations of dominant sales markets, production locations, or markets with less mature consumer expectations.”

“While we do see this from time to time, we don’t want to see a more significant trend emerge.”

Hoorweg said Government-enforced safety regulation has recently been enhanced for the European market with the introduction of EU General Safety Regulation (GSR2), while Australian regulation remains years behind in some areas.

“The lives and safety of Australian and New Zealand consumers are just as important as those in Europe or any other world region.

"That is why we continue to carefully examine new vehicles supplied locally and point out differences so consumers can make informed purchasing decisions.

"Any vehicle that is unrated is a potential candidate for testing by ANCAP.”