Official Statistics

Reported road casualties Great Britain: estimates involving driving for work

Published 25 September 2025

About this report

This report presents the Department for Transport’s analysis of road collisions recorded in STATS19 where at least one driver was driving for work. It builds on previous research by University College London (UCL), using a methodology that reclassifies vehicles and casualties based on journey purpose and vehicle type. 

1. Main findings

This report adjusts information on journey purpose recorded in STATS19 with a number of assumptions, to better estimate the number of casualties in collisions involving drivers or riders making a journey as part of work, though figures are still likely to be underestimates. 

On this basis, the overall number of collisions involving a driver driving for work has remained relatively stable between 2018 and 2024, accounting for around 24 to 25% of all reported collisions each year. However, there was a slight decline in 2024, which may reflect changes in reporting practices rather than a true reduction in incidents. 

Further estimates are that, in 2024: 

• 459 people were killed in collisions involving a working driver, representing 29% of all road fatalities

• there were 2,308 working driver and passenger casualties killed or seriously injured (KSI) comprising 1,642 drivers or riders and 666 passengers

• there were 4,759 non-working KSI casualties in collisions involving a working driver or rider - including 1,173 KSI pedestrians hit by working drivers

• the proportion of KSI casualties in work-related collisions was 23%, broadly consistent with recent years

2. Introduction

The aim of this analysis is to improve understanding of work-related road collisions by refining the classification of vehicles and casualties in STATS19. This includes assessing whether trends in the number and severity of collisions involving working drivers are consistent over time and across casualty types. 

2.1 Journey purpose recording in STATS19

Information on journey purpose for drivers of vehicles involved in reported road collisions, including recording where a journey is made as part of work, has been recorded in STATS19 since 2005. Figures are shown in table RAS0506.

However, for a relatively large proportion of drivers the journey purpose is recorded as unknown, so that estimates of work-related collisions based purely on this will under-estimate the true number of such collisions. In 2018, 73% of vehicles had an ‘unknown’ journey purpose, and although this fell to 57% in 2024 following the introduction of new categories (for example ‘personal business or leisure’), the majority of records still lack meaningful journey purpose information. 

Improvements in journey purpose recording: As part of the most recent review of the STATS19 collection, changes were made to the recording of journey purpose, to align the categories with those collected in the department’s National Travel Survey. This may provide scope for better estimation of work-related journeys in future, with a majority of records anticipated to use this new version from 2025 onwards.

2.2 Related work

To address the limitations of STATS19 journey purpose recording, University College London (UCL) in their report Driving for work made some additional assumptions to provide a more representative picture. 

Transport for London (TfL) have estimated collisions and casualties within London that involve work-related journeys, based on the UCL approach but with a slightly different set of assumptions.

2.3 Assumptions

In this report we adopted some, but not all, of the assumptions made by UCL. This improves on the STATS19 journey purpose variable alone, but means that the resulting figures are still likely to be underestimates of the true numbers of work-related collisions. The following assumptions have been made:

• vehicle type assumptions: HGVs, buses, agricultural vehicles, and trams were assumed to always be used for work, regardless of their recorded journey purpose ^{[footnote 1]}

• journey purpose reclassification: Taxis and vans coded as “commuting” were reclassified as “working,” based on the nature of their use (for example, tradespeople and taxi drivers typically do not commute in the conventional sense)

These adjustments increased the estimated proportion of vehicles driving for work from 13.2% to 14.7% in 2024. UCL made further assumptions related to car and van journeys, based on business mileage of those vehicles, which have not been applied here but could be explored in future updates. TfL made assumptions which involved apportioning vehicles with journey purpose recorded as unknown; again, these have not been adopted as it appears there are inconsistent approaches to recording other and unknown purposes across different police forces, but could be further explored in future.

Casualty-level assumptions were also applied to distinguish between working individuals and members of the public, consistent with the approach used by TfL: 

• drivers of vehicles being used for work purposes were classified as “workers”
• passengers in taxis, private hire vehicles, and buses or coaches were treated as members of the public, even if the vehicle was being driven for work
• pedestrians were also excluded from the working category
• for other vehicle types, casualties were classified as “working” if the vehicle was being driven for work purposes

These assumptions help fill gaps in the data but rely on generalisations that may not hold in all cases, particularly for private vehicles used in informal or gig economy work. 

2.4 Limitations

While the reclassification methodology improves the identification of work-related collisions, several limitations remain, including: 

• incomplete journey purpose data: The high proportion of ‘unknown’ journey purposes (57% of vehicles in 2024) limits the accuracy of work-related collision estimates, and trends over time may reflect changes in data recording rather than genuine variations 

• accuracy of assumptions: Vehicle and casualty classifications rely on assumptions that may not apply universally. For example, not all vans coded as “commuting” are necessarily being used for work

• changes in STATS19 coding: The introduction of new journey purpose categories in 2024 complicates comparisons with earlier years and may affect trend analysis

• underrepresentation of informal work: The methodology may not fully capture gig economy drivers or others using private vehicles for work, leading to underestimation

• casualty misclassification risk: Classifying passengers based on vehicle type and journey purpose may misidentify some individuals, especially when journey purpose is unknown

• lack of comparable exposure data: The analysis does not account for exposure (for example, distance driven), which limits the ability to assess relative collision risk between working and non-working drivers

These limitations should be considered when interpreting the findings, particularly in relation to year-on-year changes and comparisons with other datasets. 

3. Work-related collisions

In 2024, there were 23,770 reported collisions involving at least one driver driving for work. This represents 24% of all police-reported collisions that year, a proportion that has remained relatively stable since 2018. 

The highest number of work-related collisions occurred in 2018, with 31,105 incidents, while the lowest was in 2020 (21,289), likely influenced by COVID-19 restrictions and reduced traffic volumes. 

Table 1: Number and percentage of reported road collisions involving at least one driver or rider driving as part of work, Great Britain 2018 to 2024

Year	Number	Percentage
2018	31,105	25.4
2019	28,871	24.6
2020	21,289	23.3
2021	24,983	24.7
2022	25,388	24.0
2023	24,979	24.0
2024	23,770	23.6
Total	180,385	24.3

4. Casualties in work-related collisions

In 2024, 459 people were killed in collisions involving a working driver – accounting for 29% of all road fatalities. A total of 6,679 people were killed or seriously injured (KSI) in these collisions, representing 23% of all KSI casualties. 

Table 2: Casualties in reported road collisions involving at least one driver or rider driving as part of work, by severity, Great Britain 2018 to 2024

Year	Fatal	Serious	Slight	KSI	Fatal (%)	Serious (%)	Slight (%)	KSI (%)
2018	573	7,068	34,474	7,641	32.1	23.9	26.7	24.4
2019	578	6,827	31,467	7,405	33.0	23.9	25.6	24.4
2020	429	5,027	22,308	5,456	29.4	22.5	24.3	23.0
2021	484	5,873	25,980	6,357	31.1	23.1	25.7	23.6
2022	492	6,286	26,282	6,778	28.8	22.5	24.8	22.9
2023	464	6,366	25,866	6,830	28.6	22.7	25.0	23.0
2024	459	6,220	24,254	6,679	28.6	22.3	24.6	22.7
Total	3,479	43,668	190,630	47,147	30.3	23.0	25.3	23.4

4.1 Working drivers and their passengers

In 2024, 1,642 working drivers or riders were killed or seriously injured in collisions, alongside 278 working passengers.  

Table 3: Driver or rider casualties driving as part of work, by severity, Great Britain 2018 to 2024

Year	Fatal	Serious	Slight
2018	70	1,728	10,596
2019	70	1,695	9,969
2020	54	1,334	7,713
2021	62	1,685	9,430
2022	64	1,576	9,755
2023	60	1,564	9,512
2024	63	1,579	8,844

Table 4: Driver or rider casualties driving as part of work and their passengers, by severity, Great Britain 2018 to 2024

Year	Fatal	Serious	Slight
2018	89	1,990	12,609
2019	81	1,966	11,958
2020	63	1,517	9,112
2021	78	1,923	10,947
2022	78	1,818	11,335
2023	67	1,820	11,022
2024	71	1,849	10,252

4.2 Other casualties

Collisions involving working drivers also result in harm to other road users. In 2024, 4,759 non-working casualties were killed or seriously injured in collisions involving working drivers, including 1,173 pedestrians who were hit by a working driver. Overall, 29% of pedestrians killed were estimated to have been struck by working drivers.

 Table 5: Non-working casualties in reported road collisions involving at least one driver or rider driving as part of work, by severity, Great Britain 2018 to 2024

Year	Fatal	Serious	Slight
2018	484	5,078	21,865
2019	497	4,861	19,509
2020	366	3,511	13,195
2021	406	3,951	15,032
2022	414	4,468	14,947
2023	397	4,546	14,844
2024	388	4,371	14,002

Table 6: Pedestrian casualties hit by working drivers, by severity and percentage of all pedestrian casualties, Great Britain 2018 to 2024

Year	Fatal	Serious	Slight	Fatal (%)	Serious (%)	Slight (%)
2018	132	1,322	2,746	28.9	19.9	17.9
2019	141	1,303	2,656	30.0	20.4	17.8
2020	106	837	1,624	30.6	19.5	16.1
2021	112	949	1,874	31.0	19.2	16.5
2022	122	1,089	1,941	31.7	18.5	14.9
2023	116	1,159	1,898	28.6	19.2	14.8
2024	119	1,054	1,840	29.1	18.1	14.2

4.3 Vehicle types

Cars were the most common vehicle type being driven for work in injury collisions in 2024, accounting for nearly a third of all cases. Vans and buses also featured prominently, together making up over 30% of the total.

Table 7: Top 10 vehicle types being driven for work involved in injury collisions, Great Britain, 2024

Vehicle Type	Number	Percentage
Car	8,414	31.1
Van 3.5 tonnes mgw or under	5,428	20.1
Bus or coach (17 or more pass seats)	3,145	11.6
Goods 7.5 tonnes and over	2,483	9.2
Motorcycle over 50cc and up to 125cc	2,227	8.2
Taxi or private hire car	1,828	6.8
Pedal cycle	978	3.6
Goods over 3.5t. and under 7.5t	773	2.9
Agricultural vehicle (including diggers)	405	1.5
Other vehicle	366	1.4

5. Conclusion and next steps

This analysis provides estimates of the scale and impact of work-related road collisions in Great Britain, applying assumptions to address some – though not all – of the limitations of the STATS19 journey purpose category.

Though these figures are likely to be underestimates, they nonetheless highlight the substantial proportion of road casualties involving working drivers, both among workers themselves and members of the public. 

However, the findings must be interpreted with caution due to limitations in the underlying data, particularly the high proportion of unknown journey purposes and the assumptions required to reclassify vehicle use.

5.1 Further work

This work represents a work in progress, which we hope to develop, in particular exploring the potential to use the new STATS19 journey purpose category to apportion vehicles with unknown journey purposes, as TfL have done.

Any suggestions for improvements to the estimation method, or for further analysis, would be welcome and can be provided to the road safety statistics team by email to roadacc.stats@dft.gov.uk.

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1. This differs slightly from UCL’s approach, which grouped agricultural vehicles and trams under a broader ‘other’ category.  ↩