That’s according to a report carried out by the University of Leicester for MIB, which compensates the innocent victims of accidents with uninsured and ‘hit and run’ drivers.

The report from the university’s Department of Criminology found that 50% of respondents did not think the accident was serious enough to report or they did not think that they had to report the accident.

A total of 45% of those convicted said they would have stopped and reported the incident if they had known that they had committed an offence by leaving the scene of the accident.

The research found that older drivers (over 34 years old) were more likely to leave the scene if they did not think the accident was serious enough to report

Meanwhile 16 to 34 year olds were more likely to leave the scene of an accident because they were not insured, they had been drinking, were scared of the consequences or they ‘panicked’.

Ashton West OBE, chief executive of MIB, explained: “Being involved in an accident can be an unsettling and traumatic experience which is made worse when the other driver doesn’t stop. There is a real need to understand why there are so many ‘hit and run’ accidents.

“Until now we have focused very much on dealing with the problem of driving without insurance. Whilst the level of uninsured driving in the UK has halved in the last 10 years, the number of claims reported to the MIB from ‘hit and run’ incidents has not fallen by anywhere near this amount.

“We are working to raise awareness of ‘hit and run’ offences and the impact on society with the ultimate aim of bringing the number of incidents down. The completion of this independent research will provide useful insights which we will share with the government, police, the insurance industry and other interested bodies so that we can take action to tackle this problem together.”