BIFAlink


Policy & Compliance


www.bifa.org


Tributes to the victims of the London Bridge attack


Preventing the use of commercial vehicles as weapons in terror attacks


The government remains deeply concerned about the potential use of commercial vehicles in terror attacks. However, its recent guidance to industry does not take into account measures already being taken by the sector


Two recurring themes that BIFA encounters are the impacts of organised crime and terrorism on our sector. Tighter security measures for both air and maritime modes have made it more difficult to perpetrate attacks or crime in these areas. This has forced a shift in emphasis to other areas, including the use of vehicles as a ‘weapon’ against innocent civilians, as occurred in the Westminster and London Bridge attacks of 2017.


At meetings attended by BIFA, it is clear that


government is deeply concerned about the ‘insider threat’, where staff assist or perpetrate such actions, or ‘the lone wolf’ attacker. Government has been endeavouring to engage with trade on the subject, encouraging business to take appropriate steps to reduce the opportunity for such crimes. The UK government, in conjunction with the


BSI, recently published guidance for commercially operated vehicles in a ‘Framework


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for mitigating security risks from malicious use’ (PAS29000:2021). The document highlights the potential threat posed to critical infrastructure and the wider population by vehicles used either as a mechanism to deliver an explosive device or as a weapon against the wider public. The document is a reminder that the threats are constantly changing and come in many forms.


Government guidance The document is designed to provide guidance for all transport sectors, but in the writer’s opinion has three significant weaknesses; firstly it treats all sectors the same and does not acknowledge improvements in our sector stemming from the long and constant implementation of the Aviation Security Standards and more recently AEO requirements. Also, the document is a specification and fails


to provide practical examples, etc, to help truck operators and others to implement policies to


mitigate the threat. The third and most significant omission is that the Publicly Available Specification (PAS) does not include reference to how the short-term hire industry can take steps to minimise the risk of renting a vehicle to someone with nefarious intentions.


Areas of attention The PAS focuses on driver checks, basic vehicle security and access control measures, etc, all of which will be familiar to many BIFA Members. In addition, there are what many would regard as standard processes such as risk assessments, quality management procedures including monitoring and review functions. In a way, the document is a timely reminder of the importance of security both to prevent terrorism and, in a wider sense, vehicle-related cargo crime, both of which remain a significant but unquantified issue for our industry. The PAS is a framework of measures for vehicle operators, regardless of size, which can be adopted to devise relevant security measures.


Additional information can be found at www.gov.uk/government/news/new-guidance- published-to-prevent-use-of-vehicles-as-weapons -in-terror-attacks


July 2021


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