Held in Brussels, Belgium, the programme included contributions from leading occupational health and safety experts and the awarding of the PRAISE road safety winners in recognition of work carried out in the field of road safety.

The business case for minimising road risk

According to the ETSC, there were 26,025 deaths on European roads in 2013. It is estimated that 40% of all road collisions can be attributed to people either commuting or driving on business, and six out of 10 accidents at work take place while an employee is behind the wheel. Duty of Care laws state that for an employee who drives on business, the vehicle is registered as a workplace, and there will therefore be serious implications for the employer should an accident or incident occur during business hours.

Will Murray, research director at Interactive Driving Systems, gave examples of the staggering annual cost of fleet vehicle repairs – before adjusting their road safety policy, Nestlé were spending the equivalent cost of shipping 235m Kit Kats to cover their EU fleet damage, while British Telecom (BT) spent the equivalent of 600,000 broadband connection sales on road safety losses. In partnership with Interactive Driving Systems, BT has now halved that figure by implementing improved fleet safety procedures; demonstrating the strong business case for developing road safety policies.

Management of occupational road risk

Nicola Christie from University College London (pictured above) and Shaun Helman from the Transport Research Laboratory   presented a strategic review of occupational road risk management in the UK, from both a national and European perspective.

'We carried out in-depth interviews with 21 SME companies about how they manage risk. When you ask a company director or health and safety officer if road risk is a priority for the business, they tend to answer that it isn’t that relevant for them as a small fleet. Beyond the basics of risk management, such as driving licence checks, there doesn’t appear to be much in-depth assessment of driver ability,' Mr Helman explained.

'We have an example in our data set where a company was told by their local authority that they had to commit contractually to making a journey between two locations in an hour. It is possible to complete the journey in an hour, but only with clear road conditions. This is an example of how the wrong message from the top of the supply chain can force bad behaviour at the bottom.'

Lack of road safety leadership

The report also highlighted a chronic lack of a cohesive European framework for reducing fleet road risk.

'We need to do more as an industry to get the message out there,' UCL’s Nicola Christie declared. 'There is a lack of penetration of road safety agenda at a local level. To make a road safety initiative, harmonised data is vital, and at the moment there is no such harmonised data set available across different countries. This needs to change. Businesses, insurance groups and road safety groups need to work in partnership on this issue.'

'The insurance industry could do more; they have to underwrite risk and could lose money themselves,' Shaun Helman added. 'What are they actually doing to mitigate risk? They could work in partnership with businesses and in government, examples of which can be seen in France where there is a ministerial committee and the insurance community fund road safety initiatives.'

Light commerical vehicle registrations

The increasing number of light commercial vehicles was also a recurring theme. Topics covered include concerns about driver’s hours, training, roadworthiness, Type Approval, risk assessment, fatigue and stress management and compliance with key traffic safety rules.

'The Department for Transport in the UK has evidence that we do have a problem with vans. There is a lack of regulation for these vehicles; they can be driven on a standard driving licence and the police are reporting that they are stopping a lot more vans travelling at high speeds and are over-laden,' said Helman.

'So although company cars might not be contributing to road fatalities as much as they did, there is a greater risk emerging from other angles. This is exacerbated by the growth of internet shopping as more vans are needed to deliver to people when they purchase online. While the overall fatality rate has not altered much over the last few years, the vehicle parc has altered significantly.'

The report found this to be a particular safety concern, as vulnerable road users are more likely to be killed in a collision with a van or heavy truck. With an increasing number of these types of vehicles on the road, exposure to risk increases.

Cross-border concerns

Cross-border issues were shown to be an increasing problem. Drivers travelling across Europe can have issues understanding differences in speed limits and road signs, and the UK police have reported an increasing problem of European trucks stopping to rest in lay-bys, raising the issue of appropriate rest areas for employees.

'The economic climate where the pound or the euro is dictating business leads to unreasonable demands on employees – tachographs can be abused or manipulated to allow staff to work for longer illegally,' said Nicola Christie.

'There is also the issue of the hierarchy of professional drivers,' added Casto Lopez-Benitez of the European Commission.

'Heavy vehicle drivers tend to be highly professional and hold driving qualifications, while at the other end of the scale we have LCV drivers who may not be as professional. We are reviewing the possibility of extending CPC driver training to van drivers, and examining how we can better control working hours in the LCV sector.'

Lopez-Benitez assured delegates that improving road safety, particularly in the commercial vehicle sector, is a matter of importance for the European Commission.

PRAISE awards

Five European private and public-sector organisations were recognised for the results of company-wide programmes put in place to improve the road safety of employees, vehicle fleets and the public.

The winners of the 2014 European Transport Safety Council (ETSC) PRAISE Awards for Work-Related Road Safety, were: 

• Large company – Arriva, Denmark

• Public authority – The Hellenic Air Force, Greece

• Small or medium-sized enterprise – Bolk Transport, The Netherlands

• Highly commended – Unilever, Poland

• Highly commended – The Port of Antwerp, Belgium

Antonio Avenoso, executive director of the ETSC, commented: 'These organisations are putting road safety at the heart of their operations and have the results to prove it. We hope these shining examples will inspire companies and public authorities across Europe to see the benefits road safety management programmes can bring. These include not only dramatically reduced numbers of collisions and injuries, but also reduced costs, improved employee wellbeing, fewer lost orders and less management time spent on dealing with the consequences of sick days, paperwork and legal issues. The business case for road safety at work is clear, but these companies are showing just how it can be done.'X