Tuesday 1 December 2009

London’s dangerous lorry drivers

Funny how you never read in the press about zombie lorry drivers, or rogue lorry drivers, or lorry louts. Yet all the evidence points to the road haulage industry in London operating in conditions of massive illegality (which I can subjectively confirm from the number of lorry drivers I see driving in London while talking on handheld mobile phones). Here’s a new and very revealing statistic:

I have been fiercely critical of some of the Mayor's decisions on cycling, notably his recent decision to close the Met's Commercial Vehicle Education Unit.

Having stood out in the rain with those police officers one day last week, when 38 out of 48 of the lorries they stopped had driver or vehicle violations of some kind, I'd testify to the importance of more of this kind of rigorous road safety.