She made her call at the European Council of Transport Ministers after 58 Chinese refugees had died in Dover in a Dutch refrigerated lorry. Although human trafficking is essentially a criminal problem the Dutch minister also sees a role for the transport ministers. In addition she considers that it is in the interests of the transport industry itself firmly to condemn and combat involvement in human trafficking. European approach to road safety The Council of European transport ministers has approved a package of measures to improve road safety.
New rules are to be introduced for the front and rear-ends of vehicles and for passenger safety.
A new campaign will stress the need to use seat belts. The safety of lorries needs to be increased by means of speed limitation devices and measures to reduce the size of the blind spot, as urged by the Dutch Minister of Transport, Tineke Netelenbos. The effect of drug use in traffic, use of telematics to improve road safety and permanent use of parking lights or dimmed headlights is to be investigated. The Netherlands endorses the call for a quantitative target to be set in the next action programme to reduce the number of whiplash victims. In particular the criticism concerns the quality of the information on which the policy was based, and the economic forecasting used by the government and parliament.