Following the runaway success of its free, multi award-winning Van Driver Toolkit, National Highways has produced Toolbox Talks, a series of short, easy to follow videos – each lasting around 8-10 minutes - to help the growing number of organisations who use light commercial vehicles to educate their drivers.

The videos are available through National Highway’s Driving for Better Business programme.

The series of eight videos, unveiled at the National Highways conference held at the National Space Centre on 16 March, carry important driver information and address the many misconceptions around van regulations.  The videos also cover other aspects of safe driving, including speed limits, safe loading, roadworthiness, and the dangers of fatigue.

The straight-talking video on fatigue says that one in five incidents is caused by tiredness and 40% of such incidents involve a commercial vehicle. It goes on to give tips to avoid drowsy driving. The roadworthiness module lands some powerful points on daily walkarounds: 39% of vans fail their MOT first time; 66% of all vans stopped at the roadside have serious mechanical defects; and of those, 85% should have been identified via a proper pre-use check. The section on speed limits explains the difference between car-derived vans and other vans, why they don’t have the same legal speed limits on single and dual carriageways. On safe loading, the talk explains gross vehicle weight, kerbside weight and payload weight and the safest ways to secure a load.

The Toolbox Talks help to cut through the myths to keep drivers safe, vans legal and to ensure employers comply with not just road traffic legislation, but also their Health and Safety at Work responsibilities. Each video also has a short quiz at the end to help drivers check their understanding of what they’ve just learned.

Mark Cartwright, Head of the Commercial Vehicle Incident Prevention Team at National Highways said, “Lack of awareness is a major issue. When HGVs are pulled over by the DVSA, the driver is usually aware what’s gone wrong. With van drivers, they often say they simply weren’t aware of the law. But it’s worth knowing that 89% of vans stopped by DVSA are overloaded, and the average fine per overloading offence is around £972. Ignorance is no defence.”

The Toolbox Talks videos are available here to anyone who registers for the National Highways Van Driver Toolkit.

Photo: Mark Cartwright.