8 October 2013

Costain recently hosted a Health & Safety Seminar in London to explain how a company’s health and safety performance can create a positive health and safety culture.

The seminar, which took place at law firm Clyde & Co. was organised by Gary Mills, a Director in Costain Asset Management, and Neal Kennedy, a Safety, Health and Environment Manager. The event brought together some of Costain’s equity partners, including Laing, Equitix, Amber Infrastructure and Babcock International, to listen to presentations on current health and safety legislation.

The speakers included Keith Morton QC, an expert in health, safety and regulatory law; Victor Rae-Reeves, a Partner at Clyde & Co specialising in complex litigation cases in the construction and engineering sector, and Alan Cheung who talked about Costain’s own Behavioural Management Programme, which includes Costain Behavioural Safety (CBS), and how it has been used to successfully drive improvements in the Company’s health and safety performance.

“The aim of the session was to get as many of our equity partners together to focus on health and safety from a legal perspective. We wanted to use the wealth of experience on offer to highlight how good practice by a board of directors can help to ensure that a company’s health and safety performance can help to create a positive health and safety culture,” said Gary.

Gary added: “The companies present are generally involved in the delivery of facilities management services for schools and hospitals. Keith and Victor carefully explained the complex legal landscape and the responsibilities that are placed on company directors. The introduction to behavioural management was also a new concept for many of the attendees and Alan provided a fast moving and interactive session for our partners.”

CBS has been used to create environments where, through leadership and the provision of timely and appropriate consequences, everyone in the Company - from directors to the workforce - understands the importance of taking responsibility for their own safety and the safety of those around them.

The seminar was such a success that other events are being planned in the future to encompass other areas of the building, construction and maintenance business.

“The feedback from the seminar has been excellent. It was well attended and we have already received requests to run a similar session in the future but expanded to include some of our Facilities Management delivery partners,” said Gary.

 

Ends