It was back in December 1995 that the Belgian Road Safety Institute (IBSR) and the Belgian Brewers’ Association (CBB-Arnoldus), supported by the Belgian Transport Minister, first launched a drink driving campaign based on the “Bob” concept. Bob is the person who does not drink when he has to drive, and who is responsible for driving the rest of the party home safely. The campaign was meant to help make people aware about the dangers of drunken driving and thus help discourage them from driving their cars after drinking alcohol. After just one year (December 1996), 9 out of 10 Belgians had heard of Bob and thought it was an excellent initiative. This opinion was reflected in a behaviour change: in the latest opinion poll (January 2002), 30% of all respondents declared to have been Bob (was 20% in 1996), and 39% to have been driven by Bob (was 18% in 1996). The Belgian end-of-year drink driving campaign has been supplemented by a summer campaign introduced in 1996. Since then, driver awareness has also been increased by a permanent campaign, under the heading of “continuous awareness-raising”. As part of this continuous awareness-raising programme, time is reserved for broadcasting several series of Bob commercials on TV and radio. Each week, the Bob bus, a van decorated in Bob colours and equipped with a drunken driving simulator, supports local initiatives or meg parties. It is the job of the two Bob hostesses travelling with the bus to provide information, hand out Bob leaflets and make alcohol tests with the very same equipment the Belgian police force uses for its checks. People who test negative receive a Bob key-ring as a gift. The end-of-year campaigns each cover a six-week period, from 1 December to 15 January. During the summer period, the Bob bus visits nearly all the Belgian summer festivals held in July and August. The Bob campaign is always backed up with tighter police controls to curb drunken driving and those who test negative receive a Bob key ring. Throughout the years, the baseline “It’s party time when Bob drives” has remained unchanged. The Bob campaigns themselves, however, have evolved. Firstly, people had to know who Bob is (1995/1996; 1996/1997), afterwards their attitude toward drink driving had to be changed (1997/1998; 1998/1999; 1999/2000), and the latest campaigns (2000/2001; 2001/2002) are targeted at a behaviour change. (Author/publisher)
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