The Office of Rail and Road (ORR) “wants to see a fast return to previous levels of safety training, assessment and frontline assurance regimes”.
The ORR has said that it will be prioritising safety improvements as its role expands to cover Great British Railways. A spokesperson for the regulator added: “Reform of the railway industry will develop further as the Williams-Shapps Plan for Rail begins to be realised, and when ORR is expected to have a wider set of responsibilities than at present. “ORR’s 2023 periodic review (PR23), to determine the regulatory framework and funding for the railway will be crucial to this and for the first five years of Great British Railways. “ORR’s PR23 work increases over the year ahead. While that takes place, ORR will continue to hold Network Rail to account on its performance and value for money in the current control period (CP6).” The spokesperson added: “A safety priority for ORR in the coming year is ensuring effective change management during reform, but ORR wants to see a fast return to previous levels of safety training, assessment and frontline assurance regimes, with ORR’s health and safety inspectors to test organisations on these areas as part of routine inspection work in 2022-23. “Likewise, as passengers continue to return to the railway, ORR will oversee that train operators comply with their obligations on accessibility, passenger information and complaints handling.” In early 2023, ORR expects to take on sponsorship of the Rail Ombudsman, delivering a commitment in the Williams-Shapps Plan for Rail. This is a new and important oversight role for ORR that will provide greater confidence in the Ombudsman’s independence as an arbiter between customers and companies. ORR chief executive John Larkinson said: “Our core purpose as an independent regulator is to protect the interests of users, ensuring the safety, value and performance of the railways and strategic roads. “We will continue to work closely with government on rail reform while ensuring we are not distracted from our crucial frontline activities, such as health and safety inspection and enforcement, holding the rail industry to account on its commitments and providing services to the industry in areas such as access decisions and authorisation of new infrastructure and trains.” Improving worker safety has been a key focus on Network Rail over the last few years.
As previously revealed by NCE, Network Rail is accelerating plans to replace all human lookouts on the railway with alternative technologies in a bid to imrpove worker safety. The decision to accelerate plans to eliminate human lookouts was taken following the death of rail worker Tyler Byrne in south east London in February 2021. His death sparked anger from the TSSA, which called for a "full and thorough" investigation. Byrne’s death was just the latest incident of a rail worker being struck by a train in recent years. Another track worker was killed while carrying out civil engineering tasks near Roade in Northamptonshire on 8 April last year, which followed the double fatality in Margam in July 2019.
Original source: https://www.newcivilengineer.com/latest/regulator-demands-fast-rail-safety-improvement-09-05-2022/
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