Mr Bowen-Dawes was awarded the honour for services to road safety onSaturday 14th June 2025. He founded Dawes Highway Safety after many years serving as a Sergeant with the London Metropolitan Police’s Roads Policing Unit where he regularly witnessed the aftermath of serious and fatal collisions between heavy goods vehicles and vulnerable road users.
In this front-line role Bowen-Dawes recognised the dangers posed to people who became entangled in the open side rails of a moving large vehicle and how the mechanics of such an event would frequently lead to unnecessary serious or fatal injuries. After leaving the police he founded Dawes Highway Safety to research and develop a range of innovative safety products to reduce this risk. Most notably the PeoplePanel® which became the UK’s first commercially manufactured protective side barrier safety system. The product has been hugely successful and popular within the fleet and logistics sector and has helped encourage the universal adoption of enhanced lateral side protection for large vehicles. Bowen-Dawes is widely recognised across the logistics and transport industry as an individual who continues to help drive a much-needed culture change towards helping prevent catastrophic under-run collisions thus saving countless lives on the UK’s roads.
Quote: I rode a bicycle in London on my daily commute for many years…only to ride the very same roads on a police motorbike responding to serious incidents involving fellow cyclists and pedestrians. I always felt incredibly vulnerable around large vehicles and couldn’t understand why areas in front of the rear wheels were left open for a person to fall into during a collision. I’m doing everything I can to change that. To receive this level of recognition for my work is incredible and I look forward to a day where open bar side rails officially become a thing of the past.
Since 2015, Dawes Highway Safety has received a host of accolades and awards for its work which includes the manufacture of aluminium infill panels and a range of other popular safety and educational products such as ‘Exchanging Places’ training mats. Bowen-Dawes is also head of Corporate Social Responsibility for the British Concrete Transport Association and a familiar face at many fleet safety events.
