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Commercial Angles' Newsletter - October 2001

Corporate responsibility for business drivers

Recent research shows that between one-quarter and one-third of the 3400 annual deaths on UK roads involve at-work business drivers. Also business drivers have almost twice the average accident rate in general. The government set up the Work-related Road Safety Task Group last year to reduce deaths and serious injuries on UK roads by 40% over a ten-year period.

The Work-related Road Safety Task Group has recently been sounding out opinion on whether employers should be managing the risks that their employees face themselves and /or create for other road users. Opinion will almost certainly favour incorporating the risks under the umbrella of an employer's health and safety responsibilities. With the introduction of the concept of corporate manslaughter it is almost inevitable that company directors will be charged over road accidents if negligence is involved. The first cases of corporate manslaughter are now being tried and at least one of these involves a road death.

To protect the public and themselves, company directors should ensure that their company systems prevent rogue drivers in their employ from injuring themselves or others.

Many employers already have a system of checking drivers' licences but looking at photocopies of driving licences is not an adequate check. About 500,000 drivers were caught speeding between 1995 and 1999. The large increase in the number of speed cameras on the roads over the next twelve months will inevitably increase the number of convictions for speeding - each conviction with an automatic 3-point endorsement on drivers' licences.

Frequent offenders who need to use a vehicle for their work will risk losing not only their licences but also their jobs. Therefore there will be a temptation to show employers a photocopy of their licences before the endorsements are added. But if the banned driver is allowed to continue driving whilst at work and has a serious accident, the employer will be in the dock too. Therefore the licence itself and not a photocopy must be inspected at frequent intervals, perhaps even monthly for drivers with more than one endorsement. Also company insurance policies specifically exclude disqualified drivers from cover, so the consequences of not preventing disqualified drivers from driving whilst at work can be extremely heavy.

But controls in themselves are not enough. Employers should introduce or enhance a risk assessment procedure to manage their exposure effectively. Clear road safety policies and objectives must be communicated to employees and road safety performance must be monitored. Training or re-training of drivers and driver assessment tests could also be considered as a means of reducing the company's risk exposure.

Articles from previous newsletters