In 2023, the NHVR offered $1.5 million in funding to industry to develop chain of responsibility training.
They did they because they wanted consistent and accurate messaging about the chain of responsibility, the primary duty and the executive duty. 5 years after the amendment they admitted they got it wrong.
There was still mass confusion over the chain of responsibility, the primary duty, the legal standard of ‘so far as is reasonably practicable’ and the shared responsibility.
Here’s a quick 101 of some terms used in the HVNL
The chain of responsibility
It’s not a law
They are not obligations
It is the parties named in the HVNL that have a primary duty.
The primary duty
The parties in the chain have a primary duty to ensure, so far as is reasonably practicable, the safety of their transport activities.
THEIR transport activities – not other parties transport activities. One party does not control how another party runs their business.
Shared responsibility
The safety of transport activities relating to a heavy vehicle is the shared responsibility of each party in the chain of responsibility for the vehicle.
The shared responsibility does not mean parties share responsibility and legal liability for all transport activities, all the time. It is a shared responsibility in relation to ‘the vehicle’. So it’s fluid and it relates specifically to a transport activity and a vehicle. Because every load is different and the extent to which responsibility is shared is also different. Parties share the responsibility to the extent they have the capacity to control, eliminate or minimise the risk.
Executive duty
Under the HVNL an executive extends beyond directors and officers. It is anyone that is concerned with or takes part in the management of the business. Executives have a duty to ensure the business complies with the primary duty.
They must exercise due diligence to ensure resources, systems and processes are in use and they are effective.
Let’s recap
There is no chain of responsibility legislation.
There are no chain of responsibility obligations.
There is a chain of responsibility.
The chain of responsibility is the parties that have a primary duty.
The primary duty requires parties in the chain to ensure, so far as is reasonably practicable the safety of their transport activities.
They do not have to take reasonable steps to ensure the safety of their transport activities or any other requirement under the HVNL.
Amen.
