A motorcyclist has been awarded compensation amounting to around £10 million for serious brain injuries he sustained in a road traffic accident, reports the Mirror.
As the clocks go forward Autoglass® and the road safety charity Brake are renewing calls for government to make it ‘Lighter Later’ by putting the clocks forward by an hour year-round.
This would mean fewer daylight hours ‘wasted’ in the early mornings when most people are asleep. The lighter evenings would mean reduced danger to pedestrians and cyclists in the dark afternoons and evenings through the winter months.
It’s estimated this would result in 80 fewer deaths and hundreds fewer serious injuries each year, preventing unnecessary suffering and saving the NHS £138 million annually.
Matthew Mycock, Autoglass® Managing Director commented:
“Low light means drivers struggle to clearly see objects and hazards, and it places cyclists and pedestrians at high risk.”
“Putting clocks forward an hour all year round, will save millions of pounds in emergency and medical costs and spare thousands of people the pain and anguish which comes from road crashes.”
An engineering and construction company has been fined £250,000 for safety failings after a surveyor was killed by a reversing lorry during work to widen the M25 near Dartford.
Richard Caddock was talking on a mobile phone and could not hear the approaching truck above the noise of nearby motorway traffic, when he was hit from behind in 2008.
The Health and Safety Executive prosecuted his employer Costain Limited for failing to ensure adequate precautions were in place to separate the movements of people and vehicles.
Maidstone Crown Court heard that Mr Caddock had left a parked van and was walking northbound along a section of the central reservation closed off as part of a £65 million scheme to ease congestion between junctions 1b to 3.
As he talked on the phone, a tipper lorry delivering crushed stone entered the same section and reversed northbound. Mr Craddock had walked approximately 30m when the truck hit him.
The surveyor sustained multiple injuries as a result of being run over by the eight wheel vehicle and was pronounced dead at the scene.
After the hearing HSE Inspector Melvyn Stancliffe said:
"This was a terrible tragedy that could easily have been avoided had Costain Limited implemented basic safety precautions.
"The movement of people and vehicles on construction sites requires careful planning and effective control. It must be considered a critical part of transport management. This case highlights that a failure to be in control can have devastating consequences."
The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) has issued updated advice to surgeons that patients with a particular type of metal-on-metal hip replacement should be monitored annually for the life of the hip replacement.
Recent research by the Scottish Government has found that over 70% of drivers in Scotland admit to taking risks whilst driving, and just over half confess to speeding.
The Scottish Government has launched a new campaign with Road Safety Scotland (part of Transport Scotland) encouraging drivers to consider how they can reduce their ‘risk factor’ on country roads.
Among the risks Scottish drivers admit to taking are:
