DfT safety push to target fleets

THE police could be given new powers to visit employers and undertake formal inspections of companies whose drivers and vehicles come to their attention on the road as part of new proposals targeting at-work motoring.

It would mean the police turning up not just for traditional crash investigations, but if they felt the state of the vehicle, or driving standard of the person at the wheel, warranted it.

In its road safety review Tomorrow’s Roads – safer for everyone, the Department for Transport highlighted at-work drivers as one of the two most vulnerable groups, along with young drivers.

The spectre of the police knocking on the office door of fleet managers is the most controversial of all the measures. Transport for London has already instigated this policy for errant van and lorry drivers but the report recommends it goes nationwide for all at-work driving and that the police are delegated Health and Safety Executive inspection powers ‘either for a vehicle defect and accident or because they catch a driver committing an offence’.

However, the report stopped short of providing any more detail about what would happen next in terms of prosecutions, and sounded a conciliatory note that instead the police would be able to ‘direct employers to sources of advice and help’.

Although lacking in detail, as many of its recommendations would have to go to consultation before being accepted, the review said the Health and Safety Executive was researching the links between management failings and accidents, adding that successful prosecutions could ‘help motivate other employers to take action’.

The review also identified at-work drivers as targets for increased training, saying it wanted to improve the lifelong driving standards of people driving for work.

This would include a ‘framework of competencies’ for safe driving – effectively standards for training, testing and education that should be adhered to when training fleet drivers.

The report said that company car and commercial vehicle drivers appeared to have a high ‘blameworthiness’ when it came to crashes, with fatigue, long commutes and talking on the phone causing many of the problems.

This week, the THINK! road safety agency launched a new campaign specifically targeting ‘stress and distractions’ among van drivers, using posters and advertising.

A separate TV campaign urging people who phone drivers ‘to kill the conversation’ was also launched.