Posted By Mark Edwards Hi everyone, I am putting together a Risk Assessment for the use of Hands Free Kit (whilst in transit) supplied to company car holders within our company, I have noticed that ROSPA's policy is that neither Mobiles Phones nor Hands Free Kits should be used whilst in transit, I think it may be best to reccommend that the driver should , whenever possible, park safely before using his Hands Free Kit, I would welcome any comments. Many Thanks.

Posted By Nicky Whilst the use of mobile phones in cars is not allowed, we have a policy where there are car kits for use whilst stationary. (Also, the radiation problem is possibly a lot higher according to some research when in a car). It is not practicable for mobile phones to be banned, but the employees use their answering services and pick up their messages when convenient. This seems to work OK, but there are not many employees involved. Hope this helps, Nicky

As vigilant forum users will have noticed, this thread was started in March 2002. It was on thread listings page 1421, currently the earliest page of this forum, which I've just had a look at out of sheer curiosity. Though I've nothing to add to the thread itself, I'm posting this response to mark the fact that the forum has been operating for over 10 years now. Also, if this response puts the thread on page 1, it shows that any unlocked forum threads evidently remain open for responses - good news for any aspiring thread-dredgers! :-)

Ahh mon ami the illustrious IOSH discussion forum goes back further than that. It used to be an orange and blue design and I remember posting on it back in 1996. Not sure when it started, maybe a nice person will solve that conundrum for us?

Nic168 - you raise some very valid points above. In recent years I've experienced a few near misses while driving due to drivers having mobile phone conversations and not concentrating on their driving. A more recent and more alarming phenomenon is that of drivers who think they can drive while reading or even composing text messages, etc. Also, I've noticed recently that increasing numbers of drivers seem to be looking down at their laps, presumably at their mobile or smartphones, while waiting at traffic lights. Though some of them keep looking up to see if the traffic lights have changed to green, others do not and annoy drivers behind them for not moving off when they should! p.s. Following jeff watt's recollection that this discussion forum was operating back in 1996, please can anyone (nice or otherwise) advise for certain when it did begin?