This time it’s personal

National Highways’ head of Commercial Vehicle Incident Prevention Mark

Cartwright explains his campaign to extend health and safety rigour to work-related driving, and asks fleets to inspire and mandate road safety in their supply chains.

We all hear about car, van and truck crashes every day. Except - vehicles don’t crash. People crash. They just happen to be in a car, van or truck at the time.

Statistically, five people will die on UK roads each day. Statistically, 50 to 60 people will be seriously injured, many with lifechanging injuries.

But they’re not statistics. That’s five families devastated, another 50-60 families struggling to adapt, to cope without a breadwinner, to care for a loved one who until recently was hale and hearty.

They’re not statistics. Every one of those people is someone’s mum, dad, son, daughter, brother or sister. They are your neighbour, your colleague or your mate. It’s simply unacceptable for so many people to die or be injured. We can do something about this. However, we cannot do it alone. I want each of us to find the enthusiasm to start driving change in our own organizations, with our own colleagues, friends and family.

National Highways interacts with many good fleets, which manage their own workrelated road risk in a robust manner. These are the fleets which willingly engage with us and other road safety organisations. We need to reach the fleets which do not manage road risk, and do not willingly engage. So my question to all the good fleets out there is: What about your supply chain, your contractors – even your customers? Can you inspire positive change in those groups?

I’m always puzzled by the number or organisations with mature, robust health and safety commitments and processes, and who manage risk within their offices, construction sites, production and storage facilities really well – but that rigour stops at the gates. They don’t seem to realise that their moral and legal responsibilities extend to the road. www.drivingforbetterbusiness.com

Health & Safety legislation is very clear. It’s clear that your duties, both at a corporate level and personal level, extend to all areas of activity and they’re equally clear that they extend to your suppliers, contractors and supply chain.

And that’s where we can really make a change.

So many vehicles are driven for work. Over half of all registered vehicles in the UK are driven for work in some capacity – approximately 20 million. If you looked at any busy piece of motorway during a normal working day, the proportion of work-related traffic would be even higher than 50% - probably more like 80%.

If vehicles are being driven for work, then we can influence choices and behaviours in exactly the same way we would in any other area of our operations. Indeed, we have a duty to manage those behaviours for the safety of employees and the public.

So, we are calling on all organisations –including ourselves at National Highways - to influence and mandate behaviours and choices through our employer/employee relationships, through our relationships with suppliers and contractors and supply chains.

We can, should, and must drive change together.

Our clarion call is clear.

• Manage your own fleets, including grey fleet, brilliantly.

• Engage with your procurement team to ensure your suppliers, contractors and supply chain are in no doubt about their responsibilities and your expectations.

• Inspire your health and safety colleagues to apply their talent, expertise and energy to road risk across your organisation including supply chain.

And we, as National Highways, the Commercial Vehicle Incident Prevention team and Driving for Better Business are here to help.

Through Driving for Better Business, we have an amazing range of support materials all available completely free from our award-winning Van Driver Toolkit with ready-made toolbox talks and template policies, to the use of our Wheelright tyre monitoring tech, to our CALMDriver suicide prevention materials and much more.

This is the start of a journey, one I hope will help to deliver our ambitious goal of zero harm on the strategic road network. Commit to road safety today, and ask your suppliers to commit too. Make it a priority. Remember – vehicle collisions are not good business, but they are always personal.

The Boundary team has extensive experience across the highways sector working with private sector, local authorities and transport authorities.

We help you communicate and engage using a variety of channels from PR to video, podcasts to exhibitions, and everything in between.

We can assist with one off projects, campaigns or become part of your team on a monthly retainer.

Get in touch for a chat if you think we can help: Helen 07896 560999 / Adrian 07866 422523 talktous@boundarymarketing.co.uk www.boundarymarketing.co.uk