The National Road Safety Partnership Program (NRSPP) provides a collaborative platform to support Australian businesses to develop positive road safety cultures. It’s about saving lives without the red tape. It supports organisations in reducing road trauma through knowledge-sharing, evidence-based strategies, and peer-to-peer learning. Today, over 150 partner organisations are part of NRSPP, including major brands such as BHP, Optus, Toll, Transurban and Nestlé. With a firm focus on practical resources, peer learning and sector-wide collaboration, the NRSPP continues to play a vital role in driving down work-related road trauma across Australia.
Major projects
In 2024, the NRSPP continued NTARC2.0, a collaborative partnership with NTI and MUARC aimed at improving safety in the heavy vehicle workplace by understanding, acknowledging, and proactively improving the key hazards in the trucking industry . Through analysis of truck insurance claim data, the team produced the Major Incident Investigation Report 2024, which highlighted the key hazards for truck drivers and the transport industry in the past year.
Another key achievement was the evolution of the NRSPP’s Utilities Forum 2.0 Benchmarking Scheme, a world-first initiative focused on workplace road safety risk mitigation, with participation from ten utility companies across Australia. The benchmarking scheme helps to identify the leading factors that contribute to crashes, and the actions businesses can take for real improvement. With changes to Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) reporting due for introduction to Australia in 2025, consistent metrics and standards are needed to address safety as part of an organisation’s Social response. As an industry-wide benchmarking standard, the scheme enables ESG reporting standards and metrics comparatively measurable across the industry.
Team milestones
In 2024, the NRSPP released the final Heavy Vehicle Toolbox Talk (TBT), a multi-year project funded by the National Heavy Vehicle Regulator. The project involved a collaborative development process designed to address identified issues with workplace safety messaging, and make it easy for managers to facilitate an engaging TBT session with their drivers. With a total of 23 Heavy Vehicle TBTs, and demonstrated success of the project, the team has secured further funding to translate 13 talks into the top three languages spoken by Non-English Speaking Background drivers.
The year’s organisational road safety campaign, Are You Roadworthy?, focused on ensuring all drivers are fit for duty in all ways. Evidence-based research was used to guide the campaign which encouraged drivers to self-assess not just their vehicle’s roadworthiness but also their own mental, emotional and physical wellbeing before driving. The package includes 27 resources for workplaces including fact sheets, videos and self-assessment checklists. The NRSPP also hosts a range of webinars across the year, with the most impactful being the powerful webinar 'Your Life Changes in an Instant', highlighting the devastating impact of road trauma through the lens of Australia’s worst crash.
Other highlights include being awarded a Commonwealth Grant to create resources to support Australian businesses to strengthen their road safety culture and supporting the development and release of the VSRG’s 2024 Used Car Safety Ratings, a key consumer guide for fleet and personal vehicle safety.
Impact
Collaboration remains central to the NRSPP’s model - the Heavy Vehicle and Light Vehicle Toolbox Talk Working Groups brought together partners from some of the largest corporations in Australia, government, local councils, and the energy sector. Other forums, like the Grey Fleet Working Group and the Retail and Grocery Safety Forum (run in partnership with EY), united stakeholders from banking, healthcare, utilities, and supermarkets across Australia and New Zealand.
NRSPP’s core funding comes from seven public sector organisations across Australia that are involved in transport safety, road regulation, or injury insurance and recovery. Special project funding comes from Commonwealth grants and Australian organisations as well as generous in-kind support from its broad network of industry partners.
Led by Director Jerome Carslake, an expert in workplace road safety and program delivery, the NRSPP is a small, nimble, and agile team. Ensuring strong ties to the rigours of its university partnership, the Program is overseen by Academic Lead, Associate Professor Sjaan Koppel. Whilst the program includes many competitors, the insights and knowledge once shared from one partner could save lives in another partner and each time highlighting, road safety is simply good business – it pays its way in the long term.