Accident leads to new career in health and safety

Colin Johnstone knows first hand all about the importance of health and safety in the electrical contracting industry - which is why he has been appointed WWW Electrical's Health and Safety Officer.

Having broken his ankle while at work on-site a little over a year ago, Colin Johnstone knows first hand all about the importance of health and safety in the electrical contracting industry - which is why he has been appointed WWW Electrical's Health and Safety Officer.

Having undergone a retraining programme and completed a Level 3 SVQ in Occupational Health and Safety, Colin has assumed responsibility for preparing all the company's safety plans, risk assessments and method statements.

And he has now established a regular series of site visits in order to assess and address head-on any potential health and safety hazards and to make sure that, at all times, all WWW operatives are adhering to the company's health and safety guidelines.

'The company regards the health and safety of its operatives to be of paramount importance,' said Colin.

'To that end, I'd encourage anyone in the workforce who has any concerns about health and safety matters - no matter how trivial they might seem - or any suggestions about how to improve working practices, to contact me directly with their views.

I'm always available and open to new ideas'.

Colin is quick to emphasise that health and safety is not concerned with establishing a blame culture.

'Health and safety is not about searching for a scapegoat to take the blame when something goes wrong - it's all about the management team and the workforce co-ordinating to implement safe systems and to create a safe working environment to hopefully prevent accidents occurring in the first place,' he said.

'An essential aspect of that process is the receipt of regular feedback from operatives out on-site, where most accidents are likely to occur.

Their feedback is necessary if the company is to be able to establish whether it has satisfactory health and safety facilities, to identify any potential hazards which might arise and to ensure that adequate control measures are put in place before any danger arises - either to operatives themselves or to members of the public'.

One of the first initiatives that Colin intend to introduce in the near future is a series of 'toolbox talks'.

This is a series of site visits where, in addition to undertaking a site health and safety audit, he will assemble all WWW operatives to deliver a brief presentation on a pertinent health and safety topic.

WWW will continue to seek the advice of consultant Hedley Horsler, former principal inspector for The Health and Safety Executive, while Colin assumes all day-to-day responsibility for the management and delivery of the company's health and safety policy.

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