Work Related Road Safety Harm Reduction Action Plan

​In New Zealand, the biggest contributor to work-related deaths outside of occupational disease is vehicles. Excluding occupational disease, vehicles account for 50% of all worker fatalities and half of these occur on public roads. Over a quarter of fatalities on the road are work-related.

​Work-related road safety (WRRS) is complex because it encompasses both road safety, and occupational health and safety (OH&S). From a road safety perspective, road users are individually accountable for their actions. However, from an OH&S perspective, there is shared responsibility between employers and employees and also a requirement that those who create the risk need to manage it. To do this it is important to understand the risk, how it was created, and by whom.

​Mackie Research have recently completed a project working with the WRRS system to develop a Harm Reduction Action Plan. The plan is intended to help anyone involved in WRRS to make sound, evidence-based safety investment decisions.

​It contains two parts:

• Harm Reduction Interventions List. A list of available WRRS-specific interventions that showcase what is currently happening in this space.

• Investment Decision Process (IDP). A structured process for gathering and evaluating evidence for WRRS interventions, and for making comparisons across interventions. The process begins with problem definition then moves through feasibility, testing, evaluation, and wider adoption. Using the IDP steps ensures decisions can be made transparently and based on sound evidence. 

Using the HRAP, particularly the IDP, may increase the likelihood of reducing deaths and serious injuries (DSIs) and improve return on safety investments through greater investment certainty, less rework during design and implementation, and fewer unintended outcomes.

More information about HRAP, including a worked example, can be found at https://www.workroadsafety.org/
​Read the Work-Related Road Safety Harm Reduction Action Plan here