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WHEG held their second Traffic Forum at the Methodist Church. John Waite and Peter Leigh [DCC] briefed WHEG members and supporters on actions taken so far and provided an opportunity to answer questions. Reports from Kim Percival [Weights and Measures] and local PC Russell Crooks [Derbyshire Constabulary] were also presented.
Actions:
Did you know Britain relies more on road freight than other European countries and that operating costs are lower due to lack of road tolls which means lots of work for overseas drivers.
More than 100 lorry drivers are thought to have breached weight restrictions on Derbyshire’s rural roads during the past year, according to Derbyshire County Council. Checks carried out between April 2007 and April 2008 by the council revealed that 139 drivers were potentially exceeding weight restrictions. Officers carried out 20 formal enforcement checks and 56 informal checks at new restriction spots.
A survey last year found >60,000 of the 430,000 trucks on UK roads are foreign. In 2005 >1,000 were involved in crashes resulting in 44 deaths and 1,300 serious injuries.
25% of foreign lorry drivers checked last year were working over the max permitted number of hours. Romanian drivers were the worst offenders with 40% found to be driving for too long as opposed to 8% of British drivers.