House of Commons Transport Committee on TDG recommends ELDs for trucks

by Truck News

TORONTO, Ont. – The Canadian Trucking Alliance (CTA) is commending the recommendations contained in a report from the House of Commons all-party Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities on the transportation of dangerous goods and safety management systems in Canada.

Seven out the 10 recommendations were directed to rail safety while the standing committee made two recommendations pertaining to trucking:

  •  That Transport Canada implement regulations to require the use of Electronic Logging Devices (ELDs).
  •  That Transport Canada implement regulations to require Electronic Stability Control on new trucks (ESC).

Both recommendations have been long-standing positions of the CTA and the provincial trucking associations.

David Bradley, CEO of the CTA said, “The report takes a balanced, fact-based approach to issues relating to the transportation of dangerous goods by truck.”

In addition, the report highlighted that trucking (which transports 70% of all dangerous goods, and 77% of which involve shipments of crude petroleum) is subject to “a level of enforcement, on-road, real-time enforcement, that …. is different from that in any other mode.”

The CTA also argued that the current regulatory environment and the level of enforcement surrounding the transportation of dangerous goods works very effectively. The alliance’s main argument was that the best way to avoid crashes involving dangerous goods on the highway would be to introduce ELDs and ESC requirements.

Safety Management Systems (SMS) were also brought up and the Committee got to hear again just how safe the Canadian trucking industry operates. The CTA said the industry has a low accident rate of 0.27 accidents per 10,000 shipments on the country’s highways. Transport Canada backed up these figures by citing a 12% decline in both causalities and fatalities between 2008 and 2009. Those figures along with the fact that almost 75% of trucking companies have some form of voluntary SMSs in place, gave the committee no reason to mandate SMSs in the industry.

The review came to be back in 2013 after the Lac Megantic rail accident.

You can read the full report here: http://www.parl.gc.ca/Content/HOC/Committee/412/TRAN/Reports/RP7834953/412_TRAN_Rpt04_PDF/412_TRAN_Rpt04-e.pdf


Have your say


This is a moderated forum. Comments will no longer be published unless they are accompanied by a first and last name and a verifiable email address. (Today's Trucking will not publish or share the email address.) Profane language and content deemed to be libelous, racist, or threatening in nature will not be published under any circumstances.

*