Vehicles: Heavy Goods Vehicles

Lord Bradshaw Excerpts

Tuesday 8th July 2014 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Kramer]

I will be delighted to follow up with any gaps. The noble Lord will be aware that an important task force in London, the new Industrial HGV Task Force, which is made up of eight officers from VOSA and eight from the Metropolitan Police, was launched in September 2013. That has been extremely effective in increasing enforcement. The task force is running a whole series of exercises. Between 1 October and 27 June, it stopped 2,798 vehicles: 764 were compliant—about 27%;—1,232 prohibitions were issued; 724 fixed-penalty notices were issued; and 35 vehicles were seized. Somewhere here, if I can find it, I have more general information; I will write to the noble Lord with that.

[Lord Bradshaw (LD)]

Can the Minister tell the House whether she has information about how many people have been killed or seriously injured by drivers who were driving outside the limits, and whether for the latest year—if figures are available—she has any evidence of what happens to such drivers?

[Baroness Kramer]

Accidents that involve HGVs have been falling for the past five years, although slowly. In 2013, there were 6,524 reported accidents, of which 270 were fatal. That has fallen by 8% since 2009. Where evidence exists to show that an HGV driver is at fault, he is reported for prosecution. We do not hold the numbers of those prosecuted and the results of those prosecutions, but we will refer that to the Home Office to see whether it has further detail.