Workplace transport - a matter of life or death? HSE consults on new safety route map

E069:06 20 June 2006

Workplace transport claims 66 lives a year with over 6300 people suffering injury. In the reporting year 2004/05, these incidents cost the British taxpayer over £200 million with the cost to industry considerably more.

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) is holding a series of events to debate the content of a proposed new route map. The map, an on-line tool, is aimed at helping employers and workers manage workplace transport risk by providing a framework of current law with links to existing guidance, whilst filling any gaps with new guidance.

Several sets of regulations govern workplace transport and there are many guidance documents, some generic, others for specific industry sectors. The route map will aim to provide a clear path for all employers to follow best practice and meet their legal responsibilities, including setting out alternative ways to comply where these exist. It will focus specifically on site layout and design, vehicle selection and maintenance, personnel matters and management responsibilities.

The events, to be held in early July at Cardiff, Birmingham and Edinburgh, will be an opportunity to comment on the proposals and help shape the development of the route map. A public consultation exercise on the proposals also runs until 22 September and is available to view and comment on, on-line at
www.hse.gov.uk/consult/condocs/routemap.htm

Terry Rose, Head of HSE's Field Operations Directorate in Wales and the South West and keynote speaker at the Cardiff event, said:

"These events are aimed at employers and workers who might be affected by risks from vehicles in the workplace. They will provide a real opportunity to influence the way these proposals are taken forward. Every year people are killed and seriously injured in incidents involving vehicles at work. HSE aims to reduce this by ten per cent over three years by introducing clearer methods of identifying problems and providing guidance on how to put them right."

Details of the events are as follows:

Notes to editors

1. For tips and information about workplace transport please visit the HSE website at www.hse.gov.uk/workplacetransport/index.htm

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