A survey has found that 56% of lorry drivers have admitted to using their mobile phone at the wheel.

The latest research carried out by insurance broker Staveley Head revealed that more than half of truckers have used their mobiles when behind the wheel.

Meanwhile 27% have used messaging app Snapchat and 20% have even taken a selfie with their phone.

The statistics were compiled from a survey of 3,700 motorists, of which 254 were lorry drivers.

Earlier in the week, lorry driver Tomasz Kroker was jailed for 10 years for killing a woman and three children by ploughing into their stationary vehicle while he was scrolling through music on his mobile phone.

Their car was shunted underneath the back of a heavy goods vehicle and crushed to a third of its size, immediately killing the family, from Bedfordshire, at the scene on the A34 dual carriageway north of Newbury in Berkshire.

Kroker, from Trajan Walk, Andover, Hampshire, was sentenced at Reading Crown Court after pleading guilty to four counts of causing death by dangerous driving and one count of causing serious injury by dangerous driving.

Meanwhile, last week lorry driver Razvan Rusu was sentences to eight months in prison for being caught using his phone on a dashboard camera, which led to a motorway pile-up.

Road safety charity Brake described the driving laws enforcement as “woefully inadequate” and led calls for police forces to be handed more resources in order to catch motorists who are disobeying the rules of the road.

Data from the Ministry of Justice has shown that the number of convictions for using a mobile phone while driving has halved from 32,547 in 2010 to 16,093 last year.

Meanwhile, the number of fixed penalty notices issued has fallen by 84% in the last five years.

A survey of more than 1,700 UK drivers by breakdown recovery organisation the RAC found that almost one in three (31%) admitted using a handheld phone behind the wheel, compared with just 8% in 2014.