The latest edition of The Extra Mile delivered!

It has been a month of sporting activity, from the women's Football World Cup where we're seeing the Lionesses storming through and reaching the quarter-finals, the ashes where unfortunately the weather hindered England winning the series and more recently warm up games for the Rugby World Cup and the England Netball team making history by making it to the world cup final - have you been watching?

Whilst it's been an exciting view on the sporting front, it's been devastating to see the destruction being caused in Greece and Corfu with the wildfires. We hope none of your holidays have been disrupted, and all your friends and family are safe and well.

August bank holiday is a very common weekend for music festivals, especially in the UK. This summer, we're releasing our own theoretical music festival line up in which we have a selection of comedic bands highlighting pain points in the industry, and those you may feel as a driver. Keep your eyes peeled on our Twitter and LinkedIn channels to see these acts 👀

If you're an avid user of social media, you will be aware of the recent changes across the landscape. On the 5th July, Meta (who own Facebook and Instagram) have taken a stab at duplicating the concept of Twitter, launched a new platform named 'Threads', Following this, Elon Musk made another unexpected change by completely rebranding Twitter to 'X'. We're giving it some time before we update all of our communications, as this could change again pretty quickly!

I hope you enjoy this issue of The Extra Mile and the latest updates from Driver Require, please let us know if you have any feedback 🚛

Did you know that a police-attended Road Traffic Collision (RTC) is the only situation in which the Police can arrest you but do not need to issue you with a caution and anything you say can be “given in evidence” in court, i.e. it can be used to convict you of a criminal offence and could result in a prison sentence?

If any other party in the RTC is injured, even with only minor injuries, it is possible you could be charged with causing “Serious Injury by Careless Driving”. A “Serious Injury” includes a fractured or broken bone or a cut that pierces through the skin, so it doesn’t take a lot to meet the criteria. If you are convicted, the sentence can be up to 2 years in prison!

If you are involved in an RTC the only information you are legally obliged to tell the Police are your name and the registration number of your vehicle. Refusing to say anything else is not regarded as obstruction of justice.

As soon as possible, and before the Police take away your mobile phone, call your contact at Driver Require to make them aware of your circumstances. They can advise you what to do, they will also contact your next of kin and arrange with the customer to provide legal support as appropriate.

If you've been with us a while, you'll be aware of our regular reports and bulletins covering the HGV Driver Shortage Crisis. Back in 2020 we produced our first Report "Investigating the UK’s LGV Driver Shortage" presenting an analysis of the causes of the Driver Shortage Crisis and how to address it. Since then, we have produced a series of Bulletins following the release of the latest data from the Office for National Statistics ("ONS").

Our latest Bulletin provides an update on where we are now, looking at:

🚛Key Findings
🚛Analysis by Nationality
🚛Analysis by Age
🚛Our Conclusion

You can download the Bulletin here.

Those of you who are registered with either our Tamworth or Lutterworth Branch are likely to have interactions with our lovely Resourcer Angela over the years.

You may or may not be aware that Angela holds her HGV licence and was one of the first female lorry drivers in the UK (see photos above). Angela was a HGV Class 1 driver for Sainsburys at Hams Hall for 15 years, has also been a Transport Manager and worked for FTA for 12 years as a Freight check Inspector - she's an impressive lady!

The far right photo above is from Angela's retirement meal earlier this month - with lots of old faces from the Driver Require branches returning to wish Angela well.

We wanted to let you know that Angela has now taken her well deserved retirement and is looking forward to many trips to the seaside with her husband. Thank you for your years of hard work Angela, we miss you already!

As you'll be aware, we wanted to give our Riddle of the Month a revamp. We tried a 'Name that Spot' competition but it seems the competition was a little tricky and we wanted to make things as easy as possible for you to be in the chance of winning a £5 costa voucher.

Therefore, we're introducing our new, easier, competition - Anagram of the Month. Each month we will be sending an anagram spelling out an industry specific word. Simply rearrange the letters below and reply to this email with your answer.

The first correct response will win a £5 costa voucher... it's as simple as that!

Our Driver of the Month for August is Adrian Nuca, from our Northampton branch. Adrian works between a client in Lutterworth and another in Milton Keynes as a Class 1 driver. The branch expressed that they could not ask for a more reliable and flexible driver - Adrian communicates incredibly well with the branch and is always willing to help out where needed.

As a big “THANK YOU” for being a Driver Require Superhero we will be sending Adrian a £25 Amazon gift card. Thank you for all your hard work Adrian and for Going the Extra Mile, we are delighted to have you part of the Driver Require Team.