The Victorian government is setting up a new road safety office amid a spiralling number of fatalities this year but there are doubts about whether lawmakers have the political courage to cut speed limits.

The state’s road fatality tally stands at 153 this year, compared with 100 at this time last year. It had a record low number of road deaths in 2018.

In August, officials from VicRoads and the Department of Transport will merge under the new Road Safety Victoria office. VicRoads chief executive Robyn Seymour will head the new body.

The state’s road safety minister, Jaala Pulford, said Victoria had a proud history of being a world leader in road safety.

“Ms Seymour began her career counselling those affected by road trauma, so she knows firsthand the devastating impact it has and why we need to do everything we can to make our roads safer,” she said.

The problem of road deaths on country roads is likely to be a big focus of the new organisation.

Figures from the Transport Accident Commission show there have been 93 deaths on rural Victorian roads this year, compared with 52 at this time last year.

Centre for Accident Research and Safety expert Narelle Haworth said rural roads should ideally have 80km/h speed limits unless they were built with specific safety features to merit a higher limit.

“Realistically there isn’t enough money to upgrade them to a good level quickly. If your road infrastructure isn’t good, you’ve got to bring down the speed limit,” she said.

The chance of dying on a rural road in Australia was three times more than on urban roads, and law enforcement was more difficult because of low volumes and resources, she said.

“We shouldn’t look at [100km/h] as the default. 100 should only be if the road is good enough,” Haworth said.

She said high speed limits were safe only if the roads had centre and side barriers, a good surface and alignment.

“But if you have got roads with one lane in each direction, with nothing to prevent a head-on crash, nothing to prevent running into a tree … 100km/h is way beyond what a vehicle can protect us in a crash.”

Haworth acknowledged that cutting speed limits would upset rural residents and could prove unpopular, but said drivers were failing to understand the extent to which speed increased safety risks.

“Improving the roads costs money, bringing speed limits down costs votes, and that is fundamentally why it isn’t being done,” she said.

“Maybe the first step is perhaps bringing the limits down on roads that aren’t sealed. That one’s probably less politically problematic.”

The Victorian government launched a campaign to highlight the dangers of drivers being distracted by mobile phone use, after a summit in May.

Haworth said that while driver education measures were important, there was a limit to their effectiveness.

“Realistically whatever you’re doing, whatever is going wrong that leads to a crash occurring, the slower you are travelling at the time – the less hurt you’re going to be,” she said.