LANGLEY, B.C. — The B.C. trucking industry has established a safety council to promote safety and reduce injuries and fatalities.

The group was set up by WorkSafeBC and the B.C. Trucking Association. The first Board of Directors was named yesterday, consisting of members of industry, regulatory agencies and police forces.

The B.C. trucking industry has seen 63 employees die over the past five years, while 281 were seriously injured and nearly 8,400 were off work due to injury. The government there noted the lost time added up to 496,000 working days and cost the province $170.6 million.

To that end, the B.C. Trucking Safety Council was set up, with Bill Hubbard appointed as managing director.

“We want the public to be safe on the road, and truckers to be safe behind the wheel,” said Labour and Citizens’ Services Minister Iain Black, the minister responsible for WorkSafeBC. “I congratulate the BC Trucking Association for stepping up and partnering with WorkSafeBC and others to create this Council. This is one more example of WorkSafeBC working with industry towards healthier, safer workplaces for thousands of British Columbians.”

“I am proud of the way this industry has come together to take responsibility for increasing the safety of its workers,” added Paul Landry, president and CEO of the BCTA. “As the roads and highways of B.C. are our workers’ job sites, this will also make the travelling public safer.”

The first order of business for the Council is to set up a national ‘Best Practices for Truck Safety’ project, which will identify the principal causes of collisions involving heavy trucks in B.C.

“Evidence-based safety initiatives will have a positive effect on injury reduction in the trucking industry,” said Diana Miles, WorkSafeBC’s vice-president of worker and employer services. The new Council will work out of the BCTA’s Langley, B.C. office. For more info, visit www.worksafebc.com.