Lorries: Accidents

Paul Flynn
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport how many and what percentage of reported motorway traffic incidents involved a heavy goods vehicle with left-hand drive in (a) 2005, (b) 2006 and (c) 2007; and what percentage of those incidents were attributed to poor visibility or blind spots on such vehicles.

Jim Fitzpatrick
The number and percentage of reported personal injury motorway traffic accidents involving a left-hand drive heavy goods vehicle and the percentage of these accidents where the heavy goods vehicle had ‘vehicle blind spot’ as a contributory factor are shown in the table.

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|                                                                                                                                                  |2005|2006|2007|
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|Number of motorway injury accidents involving at least one left-hand drive heavy goods vehicle (HGV)                                              |593 |513 |470 |
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|Percentage of all motorway injury accidents involving at least one left-hand drive HGV                                                            |7   |6   |6   |
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|Percentage of motorway injury accidents involving at least one left-hand drive HGV where the HGV had ‘vehicle blind spot’ as a contributory factor|40  |40  |36  |
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