Australia must nationalise road rules: ANCAP

The CEO of one of the world's first independent crash safety authorities, ANCAP, last month told a number of Australian politicians in the House of Representatives in Canberra that autonomous vehicle function will be crucial in reducing the road toll.

But ANCAP CEO James Goodwin's resounding support for the rapidly evolving autonomous car technology came with a caveat.

"It is also vital that Australia adopts a nationally-consistent approach to any infrastructure or regulatory changes needed to remove barriers to automated driving," he said.

Before the autonomous car revolution arrives – will which surely precede the great electric car revolution that's stalled for decades – road laws will need to change.

Technology has outpaced the legal frameworks that govern many facets of life, and so it is in transport.

There's a gargantuan legal quagmire for authorities and governments, with so many variables at play. Unifying complex road laws, vehicle registration and insurance costs, who's at fault if an autonomous car crashes and kills someone… the list goes on.

It's especially tricky in countries like Australia and the US, when road laws differ (sometimes wildly) between states and territories.

But North America appears to be on the front foot, with a new U.S. House Republican proposal, whose 45 pages have been seen by Reuters, could see the federal government nationalising some road laws.

The US draft legislation to go before Congress would allow US states to set registration and insurance laws, but not so as to regulate autonomous driving tech and/or cars. That would be a federal directive.

The proposed changes would create a federal legal framework and install the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) as the lead agency in charge of regulating self-driving cars.

The NHTSA is the US equivalent of ANCAP.

ANCAP, in contrast with NHTSA, doesn't appear to be chomping at the bit to take up the same level of responsibility in Australia and it remains to be seen whether the federal Australian government will create a uniform set of road rules for all states and territories, necessary for autonomous cars (regimented speed signs, limits, painted lines etc) to operate safely.

It's not clear who will take that role in Australia.

"As Australasia's key vehicle safety advocate, ANCAP sees its role being to build consumer, industry and regulator confidence in semi-autonomous and autonomous technologies," said ANCAP CEO James Goodwin.

What is clear is that autonomous cars are going to change the way we move and live, make things a lot safer, and generate trillions of dollars of revenue.

Technology giant Intel recently released a study that suggests the autonomous car industry – or passenger economy – will be worth $7 trillion per annum by 2050.

Although it's tricky to forecast that far ahead, the way that car and tech companies are pouring capital into new projects suggests there's some credence to those immense predictions.

We know already that the majority of motorists would welcome autonomous cars, particularly those who commute each day, but who will adminstrate and regulate self-driving cars?

Will the feds and the states play ball? Have your say on whether Australia's road rules should be nationalised or future-proofed in the comments below.