No greater way to show respect to your people

At 4th Dimension we have always advised and encouraged our clients to install and manage an effective Health & Safety system as the foundation for any business transformation.

Clearly you have a legal compliance responsibility but beyond that there is no greater way to show respect to every individual and organisation associated with your business than to create a safe, healthy environment in the workplace. If you can install and manage consistently an effective H&S process this will enable you, and give you confidence to, transform other operational and business processes.

That we believe is enough of a compelling reason to involve experts in supporting you to develop your H&S system. In the busy day to day pressures of managing a business it is all too easy to allow these processes to slip and therefore using a consistent external resource can ensure vigilance and improvement is maintained. Our case study and these examples from the HSE support that view:

The last set of published figures for UK covering a full year.

• 1.3 million working people suffering from a work-related illness

• 2,515 mesothelioma deaths due to past asbestos exposures

• 144 workers killed at work

• 72,702 other injuries to employees reported under RIDDOR

• 621,000 injuries occurred at work according to the Labour Force Survey

• 30.4 million working days lost due to work-related illness and workplace injury

• £14.1 billion estimated cost of injuries and ill health from current working conditions (2014/15)

Add to this the risk of any sort of prosecution as illustrated in a recent case:

“Engineering company fined £40,000 after worker suffers hand injury.”

Whilst using a manually operated metalworking lathe, the employee’s hand became entangled with the rotating workpiece. This incident resulted in the worker later requiring surgical amputation to part of his left index finger.

The company failed to identify that employees were routinely carrying out an unsafe work practice when hand applying emery cloth to a workpiece rotating at speed. The HSE report stated:

“The company also failed to take the faulty lathe out of service, resulting in the employee not being able to stop the lathe immediately. All companies have a duty to ensure employees carry out work in a safe way and the machinery they are using is in good working order.”

Read our case study here.