Essential Duty of Care: Developing a policy

According to the HSE, case studies and research have shown that benefits from managing work-related road safety and reducing crashes include:

• fewer days lost due to injury
• reduced risk of work-related ill health
• reduced stress and improved morale
• less need for investigation and paperwork
• less lost time due to work re-scheduling
• fewer vehicles off the road for repair
• reduced running costs through better driving standards
• fewer missed orders and business opportunities so reduced risk of losing goodwill of customers
• less chance of employees being banned from driving

These benefits can be regarded as the business benefits, but there is also an ethical case for operating a duty of care policy. Road accidents impose unquantifiable human costs on their victims, relatives and friends. Accidents damage lives and wreck families. No amount of money can compensate for loss of a loved one or severe disability as a result of an accident. Even relatively minor road accidents can lead to time off work due to minor whiplash or psychological trauma, some of the effects of which can be long lasting.

The HSE points out that the promotion of sound health and safety driving practices and a good safety culture at work may well spill over into private driving, which could reduce the chances of staff and their families being injured in a road traffic accident outside work.

Their guidance in ‘Successful Health and Safety Management’ advocates a five step approach to the management of safety.

According to HSE, organisations need to have:

• a clear policy statement which is communicated to all employees outlining their safety objectives. It is important that this policy statement is vigorously supported by senior management at the highest levels. If you have five or more staff, it is a statutory requirement to make your health and safety policy available to every member of staff. This policy should make it quite clear that it is the organisation’s policy to operate vehicles in a safe, efficient and effective manner by minimising vehicle related risks to employees.
• good safety organisation with clear responsibilities and relationships, designed to promote a positive safety culture and the implementation of safety policies. Your safety objectives should be properly documented and widely available. They should clearly identify who has active responsibility for health and safety. They should explain that line managers are expected to co-operate with HR and fleet managers and health and safety experts. They should also encourage co-operation and effective communication, ensuring competence of staff at every level.
• a planned approach to safety with performance standards for eliminating or controlling risk, based upon risk assessment. The policy should have clearly prioritised and time based targets for implementation.
• adequate means to measure safety performance, by actively monitoring compliance with safety standards and by investigating the causes of accidents and incidents.
• appropriate procedures for reviewing performance against targets, auditing health and safety management processes and feeding back information so that policies can be developed and improved. This final step is crucial.

 

	The Law		Key Points
	Developing Duty of Care		Driver Training
	Car Checks		Speeding
	Private Cars		Mobile Phones
	Risk Assessment		Sources of Information