Creating a fairer culture
The Loversall Carr Junction collision in 2022 is testament to the improvement we’ve seen in safety culture, says Govia Thamelink Railway’s Dominic Morrow.
Our industry has always tried to engineer risk out. The continuing development of train protection systems is testament to that. This drive will continue, but a safety management system will always rely on a person following rules, reacting and making decisions, in all situations – including some where there aren’t clear rules.
At the start of 2000, the railways were growing more rapidly than anyone imagined. This resulted in those entering the industry often being older and more diverse than those who came before. In the case of train driving, applications often reached eye-watering numbers and it was common to have thousands of handwritten applications within days of posting an advert in the local paper. Unfortunately, in the early days of privatisation, drivers were often viewed as easily replaceable, particularly when training costs were much cheaper than they are today.
On top of that, no one organisation seemed particularly able to manage staff who’d made a competence-based mistake. This sometimes meant that passenger operators would decide that a driver was permanently unsuitable to drive trains, only for the same driver to be employed in another sector, driving safely and even going on to mentor and train others.
One of the things that helped was RAIB and other industry partners presenting evidence-based reports that highlighted that a blame culture was less likely to bring about safety improvements.
RAIB’s report into the collision between two freight trains at Loversall Carr Junction in 2022 considers the signalling situation and underlines the industry’s approach to a fairer culture. It points out the impact of fatigue on drivers and the coping mechanisms staff can deploy.
A fair culture aims to understand what a person can do to improve their performance and what the organisation can do to help. No one goes to work to have an accident or make a mistake and unless we really understand as much as we are able to about a person, we are less likely to be able to react and intervene before something happens. This is always going to be better than waiting for something to happen before we react.
The operator involved at Loversall had made the decision some time ago for every driver to have an operations manager responsible for human resources matters and an operations standards manager responsible for competency management and assessment. This double line manager approach, whilst still relatively new to parts of the industry, could offer an alternative if it is developed correctly, particularly if potential warnings, such as how an individual is coping with fatigue, are mapped against their risk profile. This will help necessary support to be given quicker.
Knowing about safety culture will improve your approach to successful implementation of health and safety practices. Check out RSSB’s safety culture hub.