Standards committee

Global Fleet Champions is a campaign that anyone can join to stop deaths and injuries that are caused by vehicles being operated for work purposes. These deaths can be prevented through government action, through good policy that controls the management of organisations operating such vehicles on our roads, and by those organisations taking responsibility for safety and saying that they will put safety first. Safety is good business, it saves money as well as lives.

Work-related road crashes are a critical, but often unrecognised, safety problem for most organisations. Too often, they are not included in a company’s risk management plan as the vehicle is not seen as an integral part of the workplace. This must, and is beginning to, change but progress is frustratingly slow.

Proactive management of work-related road risk should not be limited to high-income countries and large corporations. Indeed, the need to manage this significant risk is greater in low- and middle-income countries and smaller businesses that operate in regions where a strong road safety culture and regulatory environment are still developing. I applaud Brake for its commitment to sharing research-based best practices globally, and I look forward to working with the Standards Committee for Global Fleet Champions.

Low and middle-income countries often have the poorest quality and most dangerous fleets – including public transport fleets, public service fleets and private commercial fleets. However where good fleet management is practised, it has been shown to have a strong impact on fleet safety, reducing the number and financial cost of collisions as well as the number of deaths and injuries. The Standards Committee will work to promote good fleet practice around the globe, including in countries currently facing some of the greatest challenges.

Evidence-based fleet risk management plans change from ‘nice to have’ to ‘must have’ when responsible board directors ensure that they will never been known as being negligent when it comes to the safety of their employees. I am pleased to help contribute to the Standards committee defining and setting robust standards for fleet safety processes.

Inclusion of road traffic crashes in the Sustainable Development Goals demonstrates that the global community recognizes the huge impact collisions have on people, businesses and the environment. Improving fleet safety through the use of standards and by applying best practices will support reducing risks in a systematic way.

Put simply ‘driving kills’. Driving is the riskiest task that we ask most of our employees to do and as such we have a moral and legal need to help reduce, manage or mitigate that risk. More than that though, at Jacobs we pride ourselves on our culture of caring and we encourage our people to take the safety lessons we learn at work and share them with family, friends and their wider community. By creating an environment at work where we have safe drivers, driving safe vehicles safely, we are having a positive effect on road safety for many more people. Something I am immensely proud to be part of.

Enhancing the safety of those who drive for work purposes needs to be a critical component of our global road safety efforts. Besides representing a significant share of those road users killed and seriously injured each year, there is a well-established suite of effective countermeasures to target the group. Moreover, enhancing the safety of work-related drivers will have positive flow-on effects for other road users, their families and the broader community.

Road safety is a global public health crisis. A disproportionate burden falls in Africa, where Transaid has a long history working on fleet safety.  We are delighted to support this important initiative.

For anyone with fleet responsibility, it is important to acknowledge that the higher mileage covered by fleet drivers comes with an increased risk of crashes. By being able to monitor and measure driver behaviours, fleets gain the valuable insight they need to communicate with them, so they can modify their behaviour and keep themselves and other road users safe. I am delighted to share this knowledge to help improve safety in fleets across the world.

I’m a regular long-distance road user and really appreciate the importance of being focussed and having the right mind-set while driving. The right attitude means more efficient transport, less pollution and, most importantly, fewer crashes. I support Brake for not only striving to promote the right attitude but also providing the support to help fleets make more informed choices.

Every year too many lives are lost on the world’s roads and many more are changed unimaginably forever. Companies cannot continue to neglect the safety of their drivers and other road users. Fleet operators must take ownership and responsibility for implementing and managing robust fleet safety processes for their drivers.

Having spent many years handling insurance claims and dealing with the consequences of serious Road Traffic Collisions, I am passionate about reducing the suffering caused on our roads. Being a global fleet champion gives me the opportunity to influence standards and approaches beyond Royal Mail and help make the roads safer for everybody.

Fleet operators are being stretched more and more as they try to meet society’s insatiable demand of wanting everything now. This means operators are under pressure to meet demand or lose customers. Unfortunately, the effect of this is that more demand is put on fleet drivers to make deliveries as quickly as possible, which automatically creates more risk, not just for the drivers but for every other road user. Therefore, it is vitally important that fleet operators implement robust fleet safety processes and manage driver risk and not risky drivers. Failure to do so will only result in catastrophic or fatal consequences for all concerned.

Driving is a high risk activity and probably one of the highest risks that employees encounter at work. Increasingly, organisations are putting measures in place to mitigate the risks associated with workplace transport but driving on public roads remains a relatively unmanaged ‘at work’ risk. The development of standards will highlight these risks and provide employers with the necessary guidance to implement measures to ensure risks are reduced as low as reasonably practicable.

Active management of fleet safety and work related road risk means saving lives both in the workplace and of other road users. Safe operations are efficient ones, meaning the business reduces down-time, improves fuel efficiency and can re-invest in its drivers, vehicles and equipment. Safety and fleet performance therefore go hand in hand to the benefit of everybody involved.

Most fleet drivers make safe decisions when driving for work but research and fleet-based companies consistently report that a relatively small percentage of commercial drivers make up a significant percentage of the overall fleet crash risk. Fleet safety is a growing global problem and it is for this reason that I’m delighted to join the committee to help fleet companies develop safe management practices and behaviour-based safety interventions.

It is well known that work-related drivers have a significantly higher risk of being involved in a collision compared to other drivers, even after their typically higher mileage exposure has been taken into account. As such, anything that employers can do to manage the safety of these drivers, the journeys they make and the vehicles they use, will have a significant impact on the safety of all road users. The role of the committee to champion good practice and to set standards will help all organisations who have an appetite to manage fleet safety, and help make the roads safer. As such I’m delighted to be involved in this initiative.

The safety and wellbeing of employees driving at work on company business is an ever-growing global issue. I have seen first-hand the significant human, financial and operational benefits which can be successfully achieved through effective work-related road risk (WRRR) management. It is for this reason that I’m delighted to be joining Brake’s new Global Fleet Champions Standards Committee to help support responsible organisations by sharing best practice and helping them to develop and implement robust and safer WRRR management practices across their own organisations around the world.

In today’s society of do it for me, we expect to be able to access products and services 24/7, and receive items in 24 hrs or less, this all has to be channelled onto our road network which is becoming overcrowded and utilised 24/7, increasing risk to drivers and vulnerable road users alike, companies need a robust and deliverable policy to ensure safety is kept a no.1 priority for road users and others.

With the continual increase of vehicle use for work globally, the need to manage road risk and implement safe working practices is increasingly important; I am excited to be part of an initiative which aims to lead by example, sharing information and best practice and the intention of making roads safer for all users, everywhere.

In a world of ever increasing demand on the Road Haulage Sector, operators and drivers are experiencing stress levels never before seen with the added issue of Congestion, causing further delays it is imperative we have safe systems of work and driver health programmes.