Europe shouts about health and safety

22 October 2012

Businesses across Europe will be raising awareness about occupational safety and health during the European Week for Safety and Health at Work, which begins today (22 October).

Organised annually by the European Agency for Safety and Health at Work, the theme of the Week this year is based on the Agency’s 2012-13 campaign, ‘Working together for risk prevention’. This highlights the importance of managers and employees working together to cut down accidents and ill-health.

Jane White, IOSH research and information services manager, said: “We’re encouraging members to promote the campaign in their own organisations during the Week, and tell us about the activities they’re running. We’ll be broadcasting this information through our social media channels.

“We’ve already heard some great stories about the good practice of our members which support the campaign’s key message."

Jane highlighted the work of Hugh Kempton, Senior Health and Safety Manager at CHEP Europe, who told IOSH about the ‘Zero harm’ initiative. The scheme has resulted in no time-lost to injuries by getting workers involved in deciding on practical solutions.

Sharon Preston, Director of Safety and Airfield Operations at London City Airport, introduced a ‘Cake and safety’ day to get health messages across in a fun and engaging way. The cakes attracted staff to come along to the event where they got to learn about relevant health and safety information and talk about any concerns.

Nicola Callaghan, Safety, Health and Environment Manager at Nestlé UK, introduced a ‘Design Stage Risk Assessment’ scheme – which tackles the risk of injury and ill-health caused by equipment and processes in the food industry, by working with employees who operate the system. This process has seen a 75 per cent drop in its recordable accident frequency rate.

Email us to let us know what activities are going on in your workplace during European Week, or if you’d like to share your good practice. We’ll try and cover as many as possible.

To keep up-to-date with the latest news on European Week, follow us on Twitter and Facebook. For more information, visit our European campaign webpage.