ORR Health and Safety Report 2012

This year’s health and safety report shows that Britain continues to have one of the safest railways in Europe. Indeed, safety on our railways is improving in key areas. This year’s report highlights a number of successes, including:

• A reduction in the level of passenger harm - with the number of passenger journeys taken into account, the overall rate of harm decreased by 12% over the past year, to the lowest level ever recorded.
• London Underground, Overground and Docklands Light Railway all achieved a year without any workforce and industry caused passenger fatalities.
• level crossing safety improved, as levels of recorded harm reduced by 15% over the past year, maintaining historically low rates.

Safety on Britain’s railways is ORR’s chief priority – and while Britain’s railways are safe, we must not be complacent. It is vital that the whole rail industry continues to work together, builds on its successes, and tackles areas where there is room for improvement.

We are looking towards the next steps on improving safety and in particular, over the coming year, our inspectors will focus on helping the industry to implement excellent safety management processes, to implement change safely against a background of industry reform and to move towards the whole sector embedding a professional culture where safety is front and centre of everything it does.

Richard Price, Chief Executive
Ian Prosser, Director, Railway Safety

In this section

• Introduction
• Strategic overview: health and safety regulation of Britain’s railways
• The wider health and safety landscape
• Facts and figures: an overview of the railway’s health and safety performance
• Health and safety across the rail sector: the regulator’s view
• Our responsibilities as health and safety regulator
• Enforcement activity
• Resources

Last updated: July 2012

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