Health & Safety

What is the Board’s commitment to Health, Safety & Wellbeing?

The Board of NWMS consider that health, safety and wellbeing is the highest priority within the Business and is committed to keeping our people, our customers and the public safe by promoting high standards of health, safety and welfare on all of our sites, premises, and in all of our activities.

To achieve this, the Board will:

  • Constantly work towards improving the health, safety & wellbeing culture at all levels within NWMS, using a ‘top down’ and ‘bottom up’ approach where employee engagement and feedback is encouraged and rewarded.
  • Show visible commitment from the top level down by actively driving, monitoring and reviewing Safety standards against the Group Strategy, Objectives & Targets.
  • Ensure compliance with all relevant legal duties in respect of health & safety at work legislation.
  • Ensure Management and Workforce take personal ownership of safety each and every day.
  • Provide adequate resources for the identification and evaluation of safety risk, with the aim to eliminate hazards or reduce to an acceptable level.
  • Support Operational teams in their planning, provision and maintenance of safe working conditions via the Safety, Health, Environment& Quality Team.
  • Take action where standards fall short of our expectation.

What are NWMS’s objectives for Health, Safety & Wellbeing?

NWMS believe that all accidents are avoidable; our objective is to prevent injury and ill health, in addition to continually improving our HS&W performance.  The organisation commits to plan, control and monitor activities in such a manner that they do not cause harm to our colleagues, contractors, visitors or members of the public.

To achieve this NWMS:

  • Have an overview strategic plan and specific objectives and targets which are updated annually and monitored monthly.
  • Have set a Group Lost Time Incident Frequency Rate reduction target of 5% in 2015/16
  • Develop a health and wellbeing strategy – promoting wellbeing that educates staff at all levels about the prevention of ill health and work related illness.
  • Continue to proactively encourage and manage good behaviours through the i-for-safety campaign.
  • Will maintain safety improvement teams within each division.
  • Will close out incident investigations within 5 days and provide a prompt response and feedback to issues raised.
  • Internally and externally audit our IMS, implementing improvements to retain certification to BS OHSAS 18001  and strive for continuous improvement.
  • Have committed to completing the British Safety Council 5 Star Audit, utilising actions raised from those audits as key drivers for continuous improvement.
  • Have committed to further improve emergency planning and business continuity strategies

What are NWMS’s expectations for communication of Health, Safety & Wellbeing?

Participation and consultation are vital aspects of this policy.

NWMS welcomes suggestions from members of the public to improve health, safety & wellbeing and NWMS Colleagues are encouraged and expected to:

  • Discuss health, safety & wellbeing matters with their managers, and company SHEQ coaches who will offer or obtain further expert advice, where necessary.
  • Co-operate at all times; contribute good ideas and improvements; report defects and short falls.