Chain of responsibility and the heavy vehicle freight industry: a

Toll Perspective

Sarah Jones, Group Manager Road Transport Compliance, Toll

3 December 2015 Chain of Responsibility and Heavy Vehicle Safety Conference, Sydney

2

Introduction and Context

• Toll’s approach to CoR

• Toll’s experience

• Limitations and challenges

• Safety and price

• What is ‘reasonable’?

• Roadworthiness and financial liability

• Is legal compliance enough?

• Cultural challenges: status and authority

3

About Toll

• Commenced 1888

• Size makes it a-typical

• 70% operators have 1 truck

• 24% operators have between

2 – 4 trucks

• <0.5% operators have >100

trucks

• Owner/operators 60% of

industry, 11% profit

4

Tolls approach to CoR

The ‘Toll Way’

• All injuries are preventable & everyone has a right to go home safely

• How we go about achieving success is as important as success itself

• We must act ethically and within the law

• We will not always get things right and learning from our mistakes is part of

our progress

Safety embedded in corporate philosophy safety KPIs (beyond ‘DIFOT’)

Consistent with CoR philosophy

Market differentiator + industry leadership

5

CoR Leadership: internally facing

• Online CoR training

• Custom built & scripted

• Compulsory

• Road Transport

Compliance Newsletter

• CoR subcontractor audits

• Information/advice

• CoR court case summaries

• Tenders/contracts

• F2F training in fatigue

6

CoR leadership: externally facing

• It starts with Brian

• Customer education

• psuedo-regulatory

• Seminars/conferences

• Australasian College of Road

Safety Symposium 2015

• HVNL Maintenance Group

• Active in policy debates

7

Results

Lost time injury frequency rate

(LTIFR) per million hours worked:

2001: 50 2014: 1.8

Externally detected road transport

breaches ↓ 340% (2013 – 2015)

1 internally detected mass breach in

last reporting quarter

Toll NQX results

• Speed events

• Motor vehicle incidents halved

(2011 – 2015)

8

Limitations & Challenges: (1) safety and

price

• Investment in safety is not cost neutral

• HVNL implies that customers must consider factors other than price

• ‘Rational’ decisions = low prices?

• Consumer choice – US example

• Performance data viewed in nearly 4 million sessions in 2009

• Enforcement essential

• Varies widely

• CoR prosecutions expensive and high risk

• 1 investigation ongoing by VicRoads/ never been a successful fatigue

prosecution

• Nil CoR unit in the NHVR

• Deterrence?

9

Limitations & Challenges: (2) What is

‘reasonable’?

Figuring out what is ‘reasonable’

Ultimately, a decision made by courts

Most decisions in local district courts – transcripts not available

Guidance material common to OH&S jurisdictions doesn’t exist

What do you do?

Industry codes

‘Pseudo-regulatory’ stance

• Sub-contractor management

• Education material & training

• The ‘expert’ dilemma

10

Limitations & Challenges: (3)

roadworthiness & financial viability

• Neglect of vehicle maintenance counter-intuitive

• Tight margins & fixed costs running beyond service specifications

• Heavy vehicle inspections resulting in major defects 0.46% - 9.75%

• NTARC attributes causality ≈ 5%

• Operator obligation to maintain vehicles to a roadworthy standard

• However, no CoR obligations*

• No requirement to demonstrate financial viability before operation

• UK system

• Financiers not recognised parties in the chain

11

Is legal compliance enough?

System is not ‘national’

NT and WA not signatories to the HVNL

NT system does not prescribe maximum hours of work

Stipulates minimum hours of rest

• 2 x 24 hours rest in a 14 day period

• At least 6 hours rest in any 24 hour period

• Very conservative minimum rest

• 17 hours awake: 0.05 BAC

• 24 hours awake: 0.10 BAC

• Technical compliance, reputational risk

• Incoherent: not safe here, safe there

12

Cultural issues: status and authority

• Common perceptions:

• Where there is an incident, truck likely to be at fault

• Blue collar, low-skilled

• The customer is always right (?)

• Difficulty of challenging customers

• ‘legal snooker’ – the challenge of inbound freight

• Leadership and accountability on the depot floor

• Making the call about fitness for duty

• Our own drivers

• Other drivers

13

Conclusion

sarah.jones@tollgroup.com

(03) 9694 2816

Thank you

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