VI manager warns of safety risks...
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by Karen Miles • The Vehicle Inspectorate is jeopardising road safety "in the interests of meeting performance targets", according to a letter sent by a senior VI manager to colleagues and leaked to Commercial Motor.
VI management has distanced itself from the letter, claiming it gives a false impression and is factually incorrect.
The letter was sent from the VI's SouthEast regional manager for vehicle testing to the VI's eight other regional managers. In it he says that last month a prohibited vehicle was cleared by a South-East testing station only to be picked up later with defects that "must have been present" when the prohibition was cleared.
This is the first public reference by management on the detrimental effect that the executive agency's performance targets can have on enforcement. The VI's traffic and vehicle examiners have repeatedly claimed that road safety is being undermined by the strong adherence to targets.
In his letter Frank Ashurst says: "A certain test station, hard pressed to meet demand, has found that the only way to meet the three-day prohibition clearance target is to settle for partial inspections as a matter of course, with full inspections being very rare indeed.
"From what I have heard from other parts of the country,"he adds, "the station in question is not the only one to jeopardise road safety in the interest of meeting performance targets in this way."
Ashurst says he was "incorrectly informed" when he wrote the letter and no such incident had taken place in the SouthEast. He adds that he has no knowledge of problems outside his region.
"The letter was not supposed to be a statement of fact but something to emphasise points to staff," he says.
However, one vehicle examiner claims he sees "one or two" vehicles a week with faults that should have been spotted by a test station at an earlier prohibition clearance. "If you can get X number attests at the testing station done with one or two fewer people then the thought is to get rid of them," he says. "The paperwork is seen to be done but they haven't the staff to really do the work."
Brake, the campaign for safer trucks, says that Ashurst's letter shows that thoroughness is suffering as staff are "put under incredible pressure" to stick to performance targets.