The national road toll is a tragedy, with states and territories all failing to meet road safety targets as the number of deaths continues to climb.
All governments aimed to halve road deaths by 2030 when they signed the National Road Safety Standards Agreement in 2021.
Three years later, the strategy is going backwards, with an increased road toll of 17.4 per cent.
In the year to September 2024, 1288 people died on Australian roads, and no state or territory is on track to meet targets.
The timing of the report was critical, NRMA spokesman Peter Khoury said.
"The road toll is clearly a tragedy. It's higher than last year and last year was a terrible year," he told AAP.
"The next two months are critical as we head into what some call the silly season, alcohol consumption increases and so does the risk."
Data from the Australian Automobile Association, tracks deaths in each state and found 12-monthly increases in road deaths in NSW (up 6.5 per cent), Victoria (8.5 per cent), Western Australia (7.1 per cent) and Tasmania (5.9 per cent).
The Northern Territory had a 130.8 per cent surge in crash fatalities during the period.
Road deaths declined in South Australia (-9.8 per cent), Queensland (minus 4.2 per cent) and the ACT (minus 22.2 per cent), but those jurisdictions remain significantly off track due to previous increases.
NSW had the highest road toll with 343 deaths and the ACT had the least with seven.
Mr Khoury said the states' and territories' approach needed to be multifaceted and include educational programs, policing investment, and data analysis.
"Collecting and sharing data around fatalities and injuries is absolutely critical ... to understand the causes of crashes better," he said.
"(But) our research shows that the most effective way to change bad driver behaviour is by is the work of the police on cracking down."
Motorcyclist deaths rose particularly sharply, up more than 14 per cent since 2022, while 20 children died in comparison to 12 the year before.
"A change of direction is needed," AAA managing director Michael Bradley said.
"Governments must closely examine data about crash causes, road conditions and trends in police traffic enforcement to determine what is going wrong on our roads."
