Trucking Australia: safety a priority

Road transport safety and compliance chief Simon Skazlic underlines the importance of a proactive approach to safety in the truck industry

Speaking at the ATA's Trucking Australia 2014 conference in Queensland, Simon Skazlic, General Manager HS&E/Compliance at K&S Freighters, has called for transport operators to actively pursue a comprehensive safety strategy for the good of their employees, for the good of their business, and for the good of the industry as a whole.

On Friday, June 6, Skazlic took conference delegates through an overview of the number and rates of accidents and injuries sustained in the Australian truck industry, with a variety of recent reports throwing up some alarming figures.

A total of 787 workers were killed in truck-related accidents from 2002 to 2012, that figure representing 30 per cent of all worker fatalities, or 79 per year. Despite the steady decline of Lost Time Injury Frequency Rates over the past decade, fatalities in the road freight transport industry were roughly 10 times higher than for all other industries across an eight-year period from 2003/4 to 2010/11.

As such, the transport industry has been identified as a priority industry for work health and safety.

K&S Freighters has 2000 employees and its drivers cover a total of around 70 million kilometres per year. Under the banner of 'Everybody safe everyday', the company has a four-year strategic plan in place that outlines its safety precautions, measures and systems for 2013 to 2017.

Skazlic, who has been with K&S since 1990 and who was the winner of the ATA's Don Watson Memorial Award in 2013, said there was no room for complacency when it comes to industry safety.

"Learn from your incidents," he said.

"Get your investigations done well, get them done thoroughly, and constantly ask 'Why?' until you get to the bottom of it. Note your contributing factors, score them, and get your root cause determined. If you don't do that you'll never learn from your mistakes."

Skazlic underlined the broad range of environments in which transport safety should be taken into account.

"Ask yourself, 'What is your workplace?'," he says.

"I say there are four: our depots – the areas you control, your base – but there is also the road; there are your customers sites where you may pick up from; and there are your customers' customers where you deliver. Four different changing environments – and your safety systems need to accommodate all four."

Skazlic explained he has a technique of delivering his message when speaking to employees about adhering to the company's safety policies.

"I have an ace card – I call it my 'family' card," he said.

"It generally starts with, "Do you have a brother or sister, a husband or a wife, a son or a daughter, and would you let them do what you are doing today. Because if the answer is "No", because they're important to you, then you're equally important to them, as they are to you."

Skazlic urged road freight businesses to take a proactive approach to safety and their employees' well-being.

"You can't just leave it up to Government to tell you what to do," he said.

"This is a 24/7 business and I say to you that safety is too, and you're going to have to improve – what you did yesterday is going to have to improve tomorrow."

The sessions ended with an open panel discussion, with Tim Knowles (seated, centre) and Karlie Easter (seated, right) joining Skazlic (seated, left) in a wide-ranging discussion chaired by ATA Chief Executive, Stuart St Clair (standing).

Mr Knowles is the Director and Operations Manager of road surfacing specialist Speedie Contractors in Brisbane, in addition to being an ATA Director and Chair of the ATA Safety Committee.

Ms Easter is Compliance Manager of the Easter Group/DTC Pty Ltd, and Director of the ATA's TruckSafe accreditation program.

Based on feedback from the Trucking Australia 2014 delegate survey, the discussion covered the use of technology – from setting up online safety forums, to the use of innovative engineering solutions such as installing vibrators in tipper bins to fully evacuate bulk materials and K&S's forklift-mounted chain lift jig. Skazlic says the latter saves the company 3000 hours of work per annum while eliminating related manual handling injuries when securing loads.

The vexed issues of retaining drivers and attracting new drivers to the industry was also discussed, as was the state of roadside rest areas, automatic tyre inflation systems, and ways to improve the industry's image in general, with all the input to now be considered by the ATA to help it formulate its policies moving forward.

Trucking Australia: safety a priority

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