Our policy: We are committed to making a positive contribution to the communities close to our operations and ensuring transparent communication to all our stakeholders
Our social value commitments
Our progress
We will fully integrate our social value policy and practices together with social value impact measurements
We have accelerated our commitment to have social value fully integrated within our business by five years to 2025
A social value policy has been introduced and a social value steering committee has been formed with full support from the executive team to accelerate activities
All employees will take advantage of one paid day per year for volunteering activities
Volunteering leave has now been integrated into our leave booking system making the process much easier for employees
HeidelbergCement Kazakhstan
Social value policy
As a responsible business and good neighbour within local communities, we are committed to delivering social value through our business activities. In 2020 we further enhanced our sustainability policy by the inclusion of a social value policy.
The social value policy reinforces our core values and responsible leadership principles, formalising our approach to generating social value and integrating existing people, health, safety and wellbeing, economic and environmental commitments.
It also aligns to the UK Government’s Procurement Policy Note 06/20, an extension to the Public Services (Social Value) Act 2012, requiring measurement of social value impact achieved in delivery of its contracts, using outcomes aligned with government priorities. This enables us to demonstrate the social value impact achieved in delivery of our public service contracts, using outcomes aligned with stakeholder priorities – including Covid-19 recovery.
Our social value commitments
To drive maximum social value across all business lines, we have established a steering committee, sponsored by the executive team, to oversee the development and implementation of strategies, themes and outcomes that are linked to a social value management framework. This framework covers our six key policy areas and provides the mechanism for outcomes to be measured, monitored and reported.
Our commitment
Our progress
Collaboration and innovation: sharing our knowledge, skills, and expertise with those of our clients, peers, partners, supply chain, academia, and the local communities to tackle global challenges and increase potential for innovation
We work with the Centre for Partnering, a collaboration with UK universities to drive partnering approaches that deliver social value. We are partners of the Supply Chain Sustainability School, a collaboration between clients, contractors and first tier suppliers who want to build the skills of their supply chains
Employment and skills infrastructure: to ensure a local and diverse workforce that are upskilled through a structured development programme and supported to achieve their potential – to both meet today’s needs and to inspire future generations
We developed a new Learning Management System called Pathway, which ensures our employees’ training and skills are fully up to date, with defined requirements for all roles. eLearning is being expanded where possible to reduce travel time and make learning more convenient for our employees
Promoting the local economy: through engagement of local SMEs, including hauliers and franchisees, thereby delivering local social economic benefits, and building supply chain capability, capacity, and resilience
We offer inclusive, fair, and responsible procurement practices, including fair payment principles, and work together with our supply chain to build competence, resilience, and capacity that we can all benefit from. Throughout the Covid-19 pandemic, we were able to support our supply chain with continued trade, reliable payment and application of government guidance, helping to reduce the impact and uncertainty created at this time. Purchasing data is under review to give us the ability to make monitoring data more accurate. Currently available data shows that 91% of our suppliers are SMEs and that 65% of our overall expenditure is with these companies
Community outreach and engagement: Hanson embodies fairness, inclusion, and respect principles; involving people in decisions that affect them, listening to their needs, and recognising the potential of our business to bring people together and promote social interaction within communities
Volunteering activities were severely limited due to Covid-19 but many community donations and activities still took place with the help and support of Hanson and its employees. Over 50 smaller good causes received donations totaling more than £30,000 as a result of activities organised by our employees
Environmental responsibility: we are fighting climate change through committing to carbon reduction in our products and delivery, in fulfilling our share of the responsibility to minimise global temperature rise, and in our effective stewardship of the environment to reduce our impact on local air, land and water systems
Through our 2030 commitments we are tracking carbon reductions and many other environmental impacts in all areas of our business; with fixed targets to be achieved as detailed in this report
Understanding and communicating impacts: we are committed to defining and measuring our social value objectives, themes and outcomes, considering potential impacts in our decision-making processes, communicating our impacts using common language, driving continual improvement and promoting strong key messages that are widely understood throughout our business and externally
We have a business-wide social value roll out programme underway with the aim of driving continual improvement in knowledge and understanding – both internally and externally.
Measurement and management systems are being developed to drive the change
Volunteering activities were severely limited due to Covid-19 but we continued to support communities through the donation of funds and materials as well as PPE to frontline healthcare workers.
In 2020 we were delighted to support, among others:
DIY SOS with 40 tonnes of aggregate from our Penderyn quarry as they built the world’s first all-inclusive surf centre in Caswell Bay, Swansea.
Wakefield Hospice in West Yorkshire with a donation of 138 tonnes of asphalt – worth around £10,000 – to resurface the car park to improve accessibility. The works were carried out through CRASH – the construction industry’s charity which helps homelessness and hospice charities improve their buildings. As one of the charity’s patron companies, we provided the material needed to undertake the project.
Divoky Riding School, neighbours to our Whatley quarry in Somerset, with a donation towards a new indoor arena for its disabled riders.
Karios Community Trust with a donation of the sand, cement and mortar needed to extend their home in South London through our support of CRASH charity and with our partner Gibbs and Dandy.
The Trussell Trust, which provides emergency food and support for people locked in poverty and campaigns for change to end the need for food banks in the UK.
