The use of self-employed drivers and pressure to make on-time deliveries are risks to road safety, warn cycling and road safety campaigners.



The growth in online shopping and home delivery helped push van traffic in the UK to a new peak in 2016. However, vehicles most used by online delivery drivers, those under 3.5 tonnes, are not subject to the operator licence regulations that apply to larger vehicles, and anyone with a standard driving licence can drive them.

Giving evidence to MPs on Tuesday, Siwan Hayward, deputy director of enforcement and on-street operations at Transport for London, admitted that for anyone who drives non HGVs for work, there are not sufficient standards for vehicle safety and driving hours.



Campaigners say reported issues involving the delivery companies FedEx and CitySprint illustrate their road safety concerns.

FedEx road safety

Last August, a FedEx driver was implicated in a road traffic incident with a cyclist. After the cyclist contacted the company, a FedEx director accidentally forwarded an internal email in which staff decided not to answer any of his safety procedure questions because he wasn’t considered “high engagement” enough.

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The safety incident was the second in a week. It came after a FedEx driver was filmed driving on the wrong side of the road, apparently asleep at the wheel.

In its corporate brochure FedEx states its support for the road safety initiative Safe Kids Worldwide, yet in the email conversation staff discuss how to tackle what Trevor Hoyle, senior vice president of northern Europe operations, describes as “social media incidents”, rather than safety breaches.

The company did not respond to the cyclist’s specific questions, including what driver training was provided. On request, it sent a statement to the Guardian saying the driver had been dismissed following an internal investigation, which identified him as a subcontractor engaged by FedEx.

“Road safety is a critical public concern which FedEx takes extremely seriously,” it added in the statement. “FedEx has zero tolerance for such unacceptable conduct and we expect anyone who works for the company to comply fully with all traffic laws and regulations to ensure our roadways are safe.”

Duncan Dollimore, Cycling UK’s road safety and legal campaigns officer, said the concern was not about staff being disciplined but whether they were trained to help avoid future safety breaches. “Just dismissing such concerns and hoping they will simply ‘go away’ is to disregard corporate responsibility,” he said.

When asked what it was doing, beyond disciplining staff, to avoid a repeat of the two incidents, FedEx directed the Guardian to a page on its website, which referred to “proactive, safety-focused workplace education” and investment in safety equipment and safety standards.

Dollimore believes employers who operate and manage vans should adopt an approach similar to heavy goods vehicles operators, who are subject to operator licence regulations, as well as voluntary schemes like FORS (Fleet Operator Recognition Scheme).

CitySprint vehicles

One self-employed CitySprint driver, who spoke to the Guardian anonymously, says he doesn’t make enough to pay for regular servicing and maintenance of his vehicle, while the CitySprint livery on his van means he can’t get work for other companies.

A company is not obliged to train drivers classed as self-employed and, if it does, it risks reclassification by HMRC as an employer, and liability for holiday and sickness pay.



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“The thing about safety, it’s not about your ability to handle a vehicle, not if we are talking about a van,” said David Davies, executive director of the charity PACTS, the Parliamentary Advisory Council for Transport Safety. “It’s more about your state of mind, the pressure you are under, your professional attitude and those are things that are quite difficult to train; they are part of the company culture. I think it’s more important that companies actively manage the safety of their drivers,” he added.

Jay Parmar of the British Vehicle Rental and Leasing Association, which leases and maintains around one in six vans on UK roads, says many operators use the MOT as a diagnostic tool, do the minimum to pass and undertake little to no maintenance for the next year even though a working van can travel 20,000 miles in that time.

CitySprint says it offers automated MOT checks for fleet vehicles, online and at 41 service centres. If completed online by their self-employed couriers, at least one of these each year must be completed in a service centre. It also says it runs service vehicle checks every three months, examining roadworthiness and fuel efficiency.

Campaigners argue the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) needs to start investigating and prosecuting cases of employer negligence. But the HSE denies it has any responsibility for incidents on public roads and says the police or Vehicle and Operator Services Agency, since renamed the Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency (DVSA), are responsible.

Davies said: “[Police] won’t think: was this guy tired, was he under unrealistic pressures to make delivery slots? If the police refer it to the HSE, they might investigate but they are very unlikely to investigate in a proactive way.”

Dollimore says the DVSA deals mainly with tachograph offences. There is, he says, a gaping hole in tackling corporate road safety failures.

CitySprint said all its couriers are self-employed, can work as little or often as they like, and are free to turn down work. It says it pays some of the best rates in the industry and tries to maximise driver earnings using smart technology.

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