Date: 18/10/2006

Tees Valley Engineering Partnership

Written exclusively for the Evening Gazette

Due for publication 24/10/2006

MAKING ENGINEERING A SAFE
PLACE TO WORK

By Bryan Bunn, North East Operations Manager for Day and Zimmerman.

According to statistics from the Health and Safety Executive, more than 212 workers were killed at work between 2005 and 2006.

The Health and Safety Executive also state that more than 7,000 working days were lost due to workplace injuries in the period 2004/2005, including almost 1,700 days lost in skilled trade occupations like engineering.

These figures may seem relatively small given the size of the UK workforce, but aside from the devastating human impact of a workplace injury or fatality, these losses can also have a huge economic impact, particularly for smaller, localised firms, who suffer a noticeable decline in productivity when staff are unexpectedly absent.

While it is still a worrying inevitability that accidents will happen in the workplace, more employers and training centres across the UK are now introducing risk awareness as a key part of their inductions and training schedules. As a result, the fatal and major injury rate is currently in decline.

Earlier this year, Day and Zimmerman successfully completed two million design and construction man hours, without a single lost time accident since UK Operations first began in 1999. Our strict safety policy, which was recently adapted to include an enforced glove policy on one UK site, has also played a major part in achieving over 200,000 subcontract construction hours without a single medical treatment being required in a 16 month schedule.

As a member of the TVEP, we, and many companies like us, are now helping to maintain this high standard of safety across the Tess Valley, by sharing expertise and best practice advice, to ensure the best possible level of safety for the region’s workforce.

The Health and Safety executive now also publishes literature on all aspects of engineering safety, from using coating powders in the chemical sector, to safety in electrical testing on production lines and even reducing the noise employees are exposed too.

Designing safe facilities and ensuring they are operated to the highest standards of health and safety, will always be the engineering industry’s number one priority, and new guidelines are constantly being developed to match the progression of the sector.

The increasing introduction of safety training elements in university engineering degrees will also help to ensure that the next generation of professionals enters the workplace with a sound awareness of the risks and knowledge of how they can be avoided.