20 years: working for a smarter, safer railway
Helping those in and around the rail industry develop and maintain the reputation for Britain’s railway as one of the safest in the world
Whatever the size of your organisation, a positive safety culture has to be supported and demonstrated at the top of an organisation for it to get to the bottom. Lessons learned from safety-related incidents must be remembered, actioned, and embedded. Making safety an everyday consideration is an essential part of complying with health and safety legislation, and avoiding the significant fines that can be imposed.
The formal inquiry into the Ladbroke Grove rail crash in 1999 found that one of the significant causal factors was at the organisational level. Railtrack, as it then was, had an overly focused view on specific aspects of safety management. The Ladbroke Grove crash was one of the worst rail crashes in living memory, in too many ways a repeat of the Clapham rail crash 11 years earlier.
It was a recommendation in Lord Cullen’s report into Ladbroke Grove that led to the creation of an independent body to advise on and draw up standards that industry members would have to comply with. In 2003 ‘Railway Safety’ was born, soon to be renamed the Rail Safety and Standards Board (RSSB), as its remit broadened.
And so, part of that remit is to act as the corporate memory for the rail industry. To remember those lessons learned, to encourage and facilitate the actions needed to improve our risk management and improve safety. Our collaborative efforts produce better and more cost-effective results than any one organisation could achieve. Our core work delivers benefits that can be realised across whole sectors of the rail industry. We collect and analyse data for the industry. We use our findings to identify issues. We use our expertise both to develop solutions, and to manage the research that will lead to them. For we don’t just look to the past, we look at what’s coming round the corner, and what’s coming over the horizon. So your company, and your people, can make the decisions that will work best for a successful future. For a transport system to be proud of.
Take a look at our timeline to discover how we have been supporting the rail industry over the last 20 years.
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To continue to operate requires a licence to do so. And that depends in great part on how you meet the expectations of the Office of Rail and Road (ORR). One of its targets is a rail system that continually improves its risk management capabilities. To steer those of whom it expects good or improving risk management it has published its own guide, the Risk Management Maturity Model (RM3). Many of RSSB’s outputs, be they documents, tools, online resources, or services, will support your organisation to achieve or advance its potential in risk management—something that the ORR will evaluate at each review.
Those of our documents, tools, online resources, and services that relate to sectors of the RM3 wheel are listed in the interactive RSSB Services and Resources catalogue. Alternatively, the same page gives you the option to find those items with filters for your business type, area of interest, and specific subject matter.
Visit our Services and Resources Catalogue to find out what more value you could be getting from RSSB.