Roadworthiness standards of HGVs improving

The Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency (DVSA) has reported that constant improvements are being made to the roadworthiness and compliance levels of lorries, heavy goods vehicles (HGVs), trailers and public service vehicles (PSVs) on British roads, the HGV UK website notes.

The DVSA carries out consistent checks throughout the year on the standard of such vehicles, known as fleet compliance checks. This is to determine if these vehicles meet compliance standards and are suitable to be on the roads.

The figures from the latest report show that 90% of the vehicles inspected from the above categories passed the test and were allowed to continue driving on public roads. On top of this, just 9.3% of lorries were discovered to have some kind of mechanical fault – a decrease of 0.9% compared to 2013/2014, when the figure stood at 10.2% of lorries.

Improvements were also made to the compliance standards of trailers; more than 90% of the trailers inspected met the required standards to continue driving safely. Similarly, only 9.8% were found to have mechanical faults in 2014/2015 – down 2.7% compared to 2013/2014, when a total of 12.5% were found to be unsuitable for driving.

The DVSA is an executive agency sponsored by the governmental Department for Transport. It specializes in improving road safety in Great Britain by setting standards for drivers, motorcyclists, vehicle operators and MOT garages. They issue a number of policies regarding road safety, freight, transport emissions and more, and also provide certificates for driving instructors, MOT testers, lorry and HGV drivers and public transport (such as bus) drivers.