ROAD WORKER SAFETY - A NEW INDUSTRY WORKING GROUP HAS BEEN CREATED TO FOCUS ON OPPORTUNITIES FOR IMPROVED SAFETY OUTCOMES FOR THE PEOPLE WHO WORK ON OR NEAR OUR ROADS

Roads Australia Deputy Safety Stream Chair, Jeff Doyle, chaired a Road Worker Safety Workshop on 17 July 2019. Sponsored by 3M and Altus Traffic, the workshop brought together more than 60 industry leaders who were in accord about the sense of urgency and importance of coming together under the Roads Australia banner to consider how best to manage the risks posed to roadworkers while providing a safe road environment for all road users.

Roads Australia recognises that working on roads and roadsides poses significant risks to workers and motorists with changed roadway conditions, disrupted traffic flow, limited working space, and movement of construction and public vehicles in close proximity to workers and worksites.

The workshop was striking in that each attendee commenced by sharing their deep commitment to improving road worker safety, with the following individual priority themes emerging:

  • credibility and respect for roadworkers (current poor public perception of roadworkers);

  • public behaviour at work sites (improving social awareness and driver compliance);

  • the role of government and industry to work together to improve awareness / education and consistency;

  • discrepancies between the low acceptance of occupational health and safety risks generally, not flowing through to our standards for roadworkers;

  • the need for regulatory change (especially improved pre-qualification standards) and consistency;

  • the need to improve uptake of technology and innovation to improve safety (take opportunities to remove the person from danger); and

  • take opportunities to collaborate widely.

Pursuant to this workshop a Working Group was established consisting of a broad selection of industry leaders. The standard agenda of the Working Group is to identify and action the relationship between the following areas and road worker safety:

Procurement processes:

  1. Industry Pre-qualification requirements

  2. Industry image

  3. Regulatory compliance

  4. United Kingdom/European experience and lessons

  5. Public awareness and communication

  6. Collaboration

The Working Group has convened twice since the Road Worker Safety Workshop in 2019 with progress made and communicated to a range of stakeholders.

For further information:

policy@roads.org.au