Highways Agency - Safe roads, Reliable journeys, Informed travellers

Foreword and Introduction

Foreword by Chris Mole MP, Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Transport

Working on the Highways Agency's roads continues to be a high risk occupation.

By delivering key elements contained in the 2006/7 Road Worker Safety Action Plan, working together with our service providers and key partners, we have achieved significant improvements for the people who carry out this vital work - a step change in safety performance.

But we need to do more, because the number of fatal and serious injuries continues at an unacceptable level. We will take forward initiatives to remove the need for workers to be on the live carriageway, influence the design of road works and enhance risk awareness for road workers.

Our Strategy over the next two years will deliver further improvements to ensure that our roads are as safe as possible for drivers and road workers alike.

The Highways Agency Industry and Key Stakeholders continue to work in partnership to improve road worker safety.

Introduction by Graham Dalton, Chief Executive, Highways Agency

Delivering safe roads and reliable journeys is at the heart of what we do. Over the last five years we have seen improvements in road user and road worker safety, journey time reliability and network capacity. These improvements reflect the work that our road workers do in keeping the traffic moving on our network. This includes the efforts of our Traffic Officer Service to reduce congestion and our Supply Chain's work to maintain our network in good condition.

We believe the people who work on our network have a right to be safe. The safety of our road workers has improved over the last few years through our commitment to the Road Workers' Safety Forum and the delivery of actions in our 2006 Road Worker Safety Action Plan. However, every year a small number of road workers are still seriously injured or killed while maintaining our road network and others suffer less serious harm. This is not acceptable and we feel we can do more to keep our road workers safe.

At the Highways Agency we have decided to adopt an "Aiming for Zero" approach to health and safety. One part of this strategy is to eliminate all fatalities and serious injuries to road workers maintaining our road network. Delivering this aim will require us to work with the industry - our consultants and contractors - to find new ways to reduce risk and improve safety.

A key part of delivering our vision will be reducing the need for road workers to be on foot on a live carriageway where they are most at risk. We have therefore decided to set ourselves and industry a goal of "Exposure Zero". This aims to eliminate the need for road workers involved in routine maintenance of our network to be on foot on the live carriageway. It is our intention to lead a process which can deliver significant reductions in carriageway crossings via the Road Worker Safety Strategy being launched today, with the goal that Exposure Zero can be achieved by building on the sound foundations that the new Strategy will provide.

Delivering our "Aiming for Zero" vision will require a major change in the way we deliver road works across our network. This will require us to work in close partnership with our suppliers in order to provide safe roads for both our customers and our workforce. I believe this is a unique opportunity to change the way we work. It will require radical thinking and innovative approaches. The Highways Agency cannot do this alone: we need a cross industry approach with commitment to change.

• Download the Road Worker Safety Strategy (PDF 3.0MB)