NO RESPONSE FROM FEDERAL GOVERNMENT AS SIX DIE OVER THREE DAYS IN HORROR TRUCK CRASHES

Three people died in a crash with an oil tanker in Bowen today, which follows the deaths of a young mother and her 10-year-old son in Corrigin, WA, and an elderly woman in Windsor, NSW.

The deaths occurred as a Monash University report yesterday showed truck driving is Australia’s deadliest industry, with drivers 13 times more likely to die than any other worker.

“Our thoughts are with the families and friends of those who have died in these crashes. The evidence is there to show how dangerous this industry is and now we have the devastation of the last few days. We have had no response from the Federal Government which is too busy playing politics to acknowledge the slaughter which is occurring on our roads. This Government was warned that this level of horror would occur before they abolished a road safety watchdog two years ago but they went ahead and did it anyway. Now our families and our communities are paying the price,” said TWU National Secretary Michael Kaine.

Truck drivers are in Canberra today explaining the need for change in the industry to address the high number of deaths and injuries in truck crashes.

Since the Government shut down the road safety watchdog, 419 people have died in truck crashes. The watchdog was investigating safety in trucking, and addressing the pressure by wealthy retailers and manufacturers on transport operators and truck drivers which sees faulty trucks on the roads and drivers pushed to drive long hours, speed and skip their mandatory rest breaks.

The Federal Government’s own report showed the watchdog was cutting truck crashes by 28%.

The Monash study shows there were 545 compensated fatalities among truck drivers over a 12-year period. The study also shows work-related injuries and diseases resulted in over 120,000 accepted compensation claims between 2004 and 2015. This amounted to over 1 million lost weeks of work.