Safety stand-down; putting health and safety first

On Tuesday May 26 all of Hanson UK’s operational sites, customer service centres and offices stopped work for two hours to carry out a series of safety-related activities.

The initiative was part of our ongoing commitment to health and safety and was designed to get everyone thinking about their own safety and the safety of colleagues, contractors and visitors.

Hanson’s target is zero harm and we have established a comprehensive range of procedures – including safety conversations, near hit reporting, one-to-one safety discussions, site audits and Safety, Health and Environment meetings – to create a safe working environment and eliminate accidents.

Paul Lacey, head of sustainability at Hanson UK, explains: “Safety is our number one priority: ahead of production and ahead of profit.

“The safety stand-down was a major investment for us as the business effectively stopped for two hours but it demonstrates our commitment to safety of our employees, contractors and visitors.

“We want to reiterate to all our employees that they should always challenge unsafe behaviour and stop a job if they think it is unsafe.

“We realise this might have affected our customers, but we did everything we could to minimise the impact and I am sure that our customers recognised the importance of this initiative.”