Travel Dundee - New Initiatives Unveiled

Travel Dundee are pleased to announce two major new initiatives which are to be launched under the Company's 'Operation Safer Travel' partnership with Tayside Police. One new initiative will see Travel Dundee bus drivers being issued with DNA SWAB Kits, in a bid to catch passengers who spit on staff and the second initiative sees the new CCTV 'Yes They Do' information campaign launched onto Travel Dundee's bus fleet.
DNA SWAB kits have been introduced by major Dundee bus operator, Travel Dundee, in a bid to catch and identify offenders who spit on bus drivers.
Travel Dundee's Traffic Manager William Murphy said: "The introduction of the SWAB kits to our Travel Dundee operation means that we are able to work closely with the Tayside Police to bring the people to justice who assault our staff. The extensive database kept by Tayside Police means that we can vastly improve the chances of identifying those that assault our staff by spitting. We are determined to show full support to our staff and the DNA Kits are part of a strategy to deliver a safer environment for them to work in."
Stuart Henry, Corporate Affairs Manager at Travel Dundee added: "We have an extremely pro-active safety partnership with Tayside Police and the introduction of these DNA Kits will aid us in deterring and detecting common assaults, which spitting is categorised as."
The special DNA kits include two special swabs and a pair of gloves. Travel Dundee staff will be specifically trained to use them and have been briefed by officers from Tayside Police during the past week.
A member of staff who has been assaulted by being spat on by a passenger, will then be expected to collect a sample which will in turn, be collected by the Tayside Police and placed onto a database which works to identify offenders.

CCTV - Yes They Do! Campaign
A further Operation Safer Travel initiative launched today is a new 'Yes, they do', CCTV information campaign for Travel Dundee buses in the city of discovery.
There will be an eye-catching information vinyl displayed on each Travel Dundee vehicle, upstairs and downstairs and it is hoped that this will raise awareness among customers that all CCTV cameras on the Travel Dundee network are real and are monitored each day by the Company.
Jim Lee, Managing Director for Travel Dundee said, "On-board security for both our staff and our customers is of paramount importance to the Company. With the new fleet of vehicles we are introducing to the city, comes innovative, digital CCTV systems which help us and our OST partners Tayside Police, to deter and detect anti-social behaviour. The 'Yes, they do' message is a strong warning to passengers not to commit crime on the bus network. We hope the message will deter incidents and breed new confidence in our customers."

Published 23rd September 2004