Prince Michael International Road Safety Awards 2004

Every year since 1987, the most outstanding examples of international road safety initiatives have been recognised with Prince Michael International Road Safety Awards.

This year's Awards Ceremony is on 7 December, at The Savoy in London.

Congratulations to recent award winners (shown below):

THE LOCAL AUTHORITY ROAD SAFETY OFFICERS ASSOCIATION (LARSOA) WINS THE FLEET SAFETY AWARD
Sponsored by Roxby Media

This year's Fleet Safety Award, goes to LARSOA for its high profile CD Rom Presentation 'Driving Your Business Risk Down' which encourages organisations, including private companies to develop policies and good practice with the aim of improving the safety on the roads of their employees who drive as part of, or as the whole of, their working day.

Receiving the award a delighted Steve Whitehouse, Chair of LARSOA said

"Very large numbers of people in this country drive a vehicle as part of their employment. For some, the car has become, in effect, a mobile office. It is often not well understood that, once an employee uses a vehicle -- whether it be a company vehicle, or his own private car, at any time during his working day, it is the responsibility of his employer to provide him with the right vehicle for the job he is doing as well as the knowledge and skills to carry out the task of driving safely and efficiently. In the case of the driver of a company car that even includes his journey from home to and from his place of work.

"This purpose of this excellent CD Rom resource is to provide Road Safety professionals as well as employers with the information, advice and options they need in their ongoing work of improving the safety on the roads of all drivers as well as other road users."

The Award was presented at LARSOA's Meeting in Birmingham on Tuesday 12 October by Roger King, chief executive of The Road Haulage Association and a director of RoadSafe, the organisers of the Prince Michael International Road Safety Awards Scheme.

The Fleet Service Award, sponsored by Roxby Media publishers of RoadSafe magazine, is given annually for a fleet operator or supplier to fleets which demonstrates an outstanding service or dedication or for an innovative product or service which will enhance fleet safety.

The CD Rom was the result of several months of very hard work by a small team of Eastern Counties Road Safety Officers, with technical assistance from Stennik Communications, a Norfolk-based Public Relations company. Nearly 3000 copies have so far been snapped up by local authorities as well as businesses and commercial organisations.

http://www.larsoa.org.uk/news_oct04/news10_larsoa_cd.html

British Telecom's innovative and broad-based driver risk assessment program, developed in partnership with Interactive Driving Systems, has been recognised for its contribution to road safety, receiving the prestigious Prince Michael International Road Safety Award for 2004.

Over the past four years BT has undertaken many proactive steps to identify and reduce the risks faced by its staff. One of the most wide ranging interventions has been its application of the IDS on-line RoadRISK assessment program called Starting Point in BT, which has helped to reduce its insurance claims by 30% in recent years, 8% in the last 12 months. To date over 27,000 BT people have undertaken the assessment of their attitude, hazard perception, knowledge, behaviour and exposure. A similar number are scheduled to undertake the assessment in the coming months.

The Prince Michael Road Safety Award judges summed up the program as follows: "BT is a company with a good safety culture. IDS have produced an easy to use assessment tool which is soundly based and well worthy of recognition as a significant contributor to improved occupational road safety."

In fact, no known program on a similar scale has been undertaken anywhere in the world before, as the costs of developing individual-driver based interventions across such a large number of drivers has traditionally been seen as excessively prohibitive. This point was made strongly by Dave Wallington, the BT Group Safety Manager, and one of the main project champions for the program. He said: "We identified that driving was one of the biggest and most expensive risks encountered by our staff, and reviewed several interventions, including on-road and classroom-based driver training, but the costs and operational disruptions involved for an organisation with over 80,000 staff and 50,000 vehicles made these options very impractical without an initial filter to identify the people most in-need. The on-line solution offered by IDS was low cost, relatively easy to role out to a large number of staff and has allowed us to filter out the most at-risk drivers requiring further attention."

Typically the results from the Starting Point assessment are fed into a targeted training program for both drivers and managers. This involves individual email-based feedback, internet-based training, and discussion workshops or - where it is deemed necessary and cost effective - an appropriate form of on-road in-vehicle assessment and training targeted at the actual risks. Four independent project evaluation studies undertaken by Napier University between Mach 2003 and May 2004 have helped to validate the program and confirm that it was the correct approach.

Wallington continued: "The beauty of winning this award is that it gives us some recognition for the scale and success of our driver risk assessment program, which is important for both our internal and external stakeholders, and it also provides the added motivation and buzz not to rest on our laurels but to continue the program -- for the remainder of our BT staff, for our contractors, sub-contractors and family members driving BT vehicles. Given our scale, we believe that we can influence the general road safety within the wider communities in which we operate for the benefit of society as a whole."

This year Lancashire County Council's Road Safety Group was recognised for its achievement and innovation in two pioneering schemes that have made an invaluable contribution to road safety.

One award was received for the Speed Awareness Course, which is offered as an alternative to a fine and penalty points for speeding. Designed by the Road Safety Group, the course is currently managed, administered and run by the Group on behalf of Lancashire Constabulary. On average, over a thousand clients per month take up the course. Their positive feedback is reflected in the success of gaining this award. The secret behind the success of this pioneering course is based on the structure encompassing both theory and practical elements.

A commendation was also awarded to the Right Start programme which aims to provide pedestrian training to all 5 to 7 year olds in Lancashire. The three tiered progressive programme is also based on theory and practical sessions. Since 1999, over 22,000 children have benefited from this free but essential service, which makes use of invaluable input from volunteering adults, including parents. This cascade system of training has enabled the Group to reach this high target in such a short time throughout the County of Lancashire.

YOUNG DRIVERS CAMPAIGN -- 'FOR MY GIRLFRIEND'

The emotionally hard-hitting road safety publicity campaign -- 'For my girlfriend' -- was developed by the eastern region group of local authority road safety officers (LARSOA). The campaign evolved out of the findings of a research project into attitudes among younger drivers towards driving, speed and road safety.

The study found that young drivers -- especially young males -- find it almost impossible to imagine killing or injuring themselves in a road crash. It also revealed that the outcome they dread most is killing or maiming someone they are close to -- for example a girlfriend or best mate -- who is travelling in a car driven by them. They considered this to be worse than killing or injuring a pedestrian (even a child) or an unknown third party.

For my girlfriend plays on this emotional vulnerability by confronting a young male driver with the awful prospect of killing his girlfriend passenger, as a result of driving too fast. The campaign message is communicated via a postcard and Valentine Card carrying the message "For my girlfriend. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to kill you." The cards are distributed to young people with the help of educational establishments, pubs and nightclubs, leisure centres and major employers -- places where young people are likely be found in significant numbers. Around 750,000 cards have been distributed in the two years since the campaign was launched.

The campaign is backed by a comprehensive website, http://www.fmg.org.uk, which contains information to help young drivers get the most from their driving -- covering insurance, vehicle maintenance and reaction times -- alongside advice about road safety issues.

The Prince Michael Award is to be presented at the climax of a competition to promote the campaign website. Contestants were asked to answer five road-safety related questions, and the fifteen lucky winners and their guests will have an action-packed day at Silverstone, home to the British Grand Prix, on Saturday 30 October.

Although the campaign was developed and launched in the eastern region, it has subsequently spread to other parts of the country. By the end of 2004, the campaign will have been deployed in the Thames Valley region, Kent & Medway, Sussex, Lancashire, London and Somerset. It will also launch in Hampshire and the Isle of Wight in January 2005.

SCHOOL DRIVER PROGRAM RECEIVES EDUCATION AND TRAINING AWARD

Sponsored by Wincanton PLC

Bruton School for Girls is the only school in the country to have its own Driving Instructor and car offering a unique and comprehensive Driver Training and Education programme which, through the presentation of this prestigious award, has been acknowledged as a beacon project.

All members of the Sixth Form participate in classroom Driver Education lessons which provide an environment in which the various areas of knowledge, skill and attitude needed to create safe, competent drivers can be taught. Practical lessons are then available in the School's own dual-controlled vehicle.

For Further Information contact please contact Mr Michael McDouall on 01749 814502 http://www.brutonschool.co.uk

CHESHIRE CC -- THE ZONE

September 2002 saw the launch by Cheshire County Council's Road Safety Unit of an innovative cycle safety magazine for pre-teens, called The Zone. The magazine was launched during special assemblies at selected schools in the six Cheshire districts and timed to coincide with the beginning of the new school year when many of the target age group may have been considering cycling to school for the first time. Shortly afterwards, we made the magazine available for purchase by external groups and organisations. To date they have sold over 100,000 copies nationwide and interest has been expressed from as far afield as New Zealand.

The Zone was developed as a way of providing information, activities and advice on safer cycling to address the high casualty rates amongst cyclists in the 12 - 15 age group. The magazine complements our Year 7 cycle training scheme which we are currently promoting with the same aim. However, a copy of the magazine is annually made available for every eligible pupil across Cheshire, whether they undertake our cycle training scheme or not, ensuring that all have the opportunity to access and benefit from the material.

In addition to using The Zone alongside cycle training, schools have used the magazine as a curriculum resource within PSHE and Citizenship and as a basis for form tutorial groups for which we have produced details of possible teaching activities to support this. It has also been utilised by other local authorities as part of Safer Routes to School projects or as transition or induction material for Year 6 / 7.

NOMINATIONS FOR FUTURE AWARDS