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| Health and safetyThe safety of our employees, contractors and the communities in which we operate is an integral part of our business. We aspire to zero harm. We seek to create a mindset and an environment where people believe it is possible to work injury free, regardless of where they are in the world, what role they undertake, or in which operating entity they work. Fatal accidents Regrettably, the Group recorded nine (2008: 16) fatal accidents during the course of the year, all within our South African operations. Our sincere sympathies go to the families, friends and colleagues of our deceased colleagues. Although this is an improvement on the previous year and our lowest level of fatalities in the last five years, we remain determined to do all in our power to eliminate fatalities from our operations. Three (2008: seven) of the fatalities occurred in underground mining operations in South Africa and five (2008: nine) were recorded in the South African construction operations. One fatality (2008: 0) was recorded at the Group's fixed facility operations during the year. The nine fatalities occurred in two months either side of the year-end shutdown, four in November 2008 and five in January 2009. We therefore experienced 10 fatality free months which provides encouragement that we are making strides towards our target of zero fatalities. Group leadership is working on actions to eliminate fatal and disabling accidents. External independent forensic investigation is conducted into all fatal accidents to properly understand, recreate, and identify their cause. Safety The group consolidated lost time injury frequency rate (LTIFR) increased marginally to 2,87 during the year (2008: 2,44), and remained below the short term milestone target of 3,0. Our target over the next three years is to reduce LTIFR by 33% per annum in order to achieve our objective of less than 1,0. The graph in the next column illustrates the Group's historic quarterly performance against target. Construction operations continue to record the lowest LTIFR performance of all clusters at 1,60. The mining and fixed facility operations increased their LTIFR to 4,94 and 7,96, respectively, but both showed improvement during the last quarter of the year. The reasons for the increased number of lost time injuries is varied, however increased employee uncertainty as a consequence of retrenchments in the mining and construction operations in South Africa and increased delivery pressure have been important contributors. In addition, changes in the leadership teams of several manufacturing operations have also contributed to lower levels of employee engagement which has impacted safety performance. An increase in safety awareness and leadership commitment to safety has seen an improvement in the LTIFR in the second half of the year.
Safe workplaces - our approach Murray & Roberts has reviewed its approach to managing safety in its workplaces and has developed a model that clearly articulates the roles, responsibility and accountability of corporate office versus the operations. Our approach to safety is incorporated in our charter, which states that we value health, safety and the environment by integrating sound health, safety and environment management into all activities to achieve zero harm. Group HSE framework, policy and targets The group HSE framework seeks to implement a continuous improvement risk-based approach to better understand and treat the exposures facing Murray & Roberts. The framework serves to guide operational HSE management, policies, standards and procedures. The group HSE policy outlines Murray & Roberts' aspiration of zero harm to the health and safety of its employees, subcontractors and suppliers, visitors, and others under its managerial control. This aspiration is reflected in our group wide targets of:
Hand signals allow workers to communicate vital safety messages to each other in noisy environments, over vast distances and at differing heights.
Safety standards The Murray & Roberts risk model for health, safety and environment is based on the following standards: Recognition of the three generically different types of business within the Group:
The requirement that operating entities within each of these three business types develop appropriate HSE models which will include:
Clear accountability for all health, safety and environmental risks and management thereof across all levels of the organisation:
Our line managers are accountable for the implementation of these standards and responsible for ensuring that supporting systems, policies, procedures and facilities are in place. They are required to train their employees against these policies and procedures, undertake regular safety and behaviour inspections at the working level and conduct incident investigations. Safety indicators Murray & Roberts currently utilises a set of lag indicators to measure overall safety effectiveness and performance. In order to improve our measurement of safety effectiveness and performance Murray & Roberts will introduce a set of lead indicators to enable effective intervention to address or reverse a negative trend before it results in injury, damage or loss. The Group has already empowered employees to take control of safety which, if effective, will lead to an organisational safety climate. In order to effectively manage a mix of leading and lagging indicators, a more sophisticated reporting system will be deployed across the Group which will also lead to greater consistency in reporting across the Group's operating entities. Murray & Roberts will align its lead indicators to those used by major clients and best practice companies. Some examples include:
In order to better understand workplace incidents we will report all injuries. The metric we track is the total injury frequency rate (TIFR), which is the total number of injuries resulting in lost time, medical treatment, and first aid treatment per million work hours. Due to lack of consistency in reporting medical treatment and first aid cases, our current focus is on the LTIFR. Serious accident prevention In seeking to achieve zero harm we have learnt that low injury frequency rates do not mean low fatality rates and we cannot and should not draw any comfort from low injury rates in terms of our capacity to eliminate fatalities. Our fatalities often have similar underlying causes and as such we have identified six generic areas of serious accident risks that exist within the Group, namely:
Serious accidents and fatalities are deemed to be a complete failure of an HSE management system. In order to eliminate such accidents, further layers of control measures are required for certain areas of exposure. Our current approach is for each operating entity to develop an annual serious accident prevention plan, highlighting company specific areas of exposure to the abovementioned risks. In addition to the minimum requirement control measures, the plan will include specific measures to address these areas. Given that we have until recently continued to experience fatalities across the Group we will establish fatal risk control protocols that establish minimum performance expectations for managing potential fatal risks associated with the abovementioned exposures. Leadership and line accountability Every person's behaviour contributes to an injury-free workplace. Leadership, in particular, can have a powerful impact on the transition to an interdependent safety culture. The journey towards zero harm requires strong leadership, the involvement of all employees and the need to develop a genuine and active approach to caring for all employees, contractors, communities and the environment. Our approach to safety is based on management being accountable for the safety culture and performance of their business, the implementation of the HSE policy and meeting the performance requirements of the HSE framework. The Murray & Roberts leadership succession and development model provides guidelines on what it takes to be a Murray & Roberts leader. It is designed with a mix of core attributes and behaviours that we require our leaders to demonstrate, identify and develop in others, and thereafter reward. The performance standards defining the expected outcome of a Murray & Roberts leader include risk results, where it is expected of operating entity leaders to:
Managers at all levels, from executive to frontline management, are accountable for safety. They are expected to lead by example and demonstrate a visible commitment to safety behaviour and awareness, making every effort to embed safe behaviour in employees and contractors throughout all operations and activities. Managers are responsible for upholding the STOP.THINK Bill of Rights afforded to all Murray & Roberts employees. In order to improve the competency of all managers, Murray & Roberts is introducing a safety leadership development program to ensure that all levels of supervision understand what is expected of them in a leadership role and why it is so important. The program will cover people and safety management skills. Successful completion of this program will constitute a Licence to Supervise. Communication and safety awareness Murray & Roberts introduced STOP.THINK as a bespoke campaign that focuses on raising safety awareness across all Murray & Roberts sites. The Group has developed an extensive collection of collateral that is used on work sites, including:
We will continue to build on the collateral and reinforce its use across the Group. We are currently in the process of developing a new series of STOP.THINK awareness videos to be branded STOP.THINK Moments, where we will re-enact serious incidents and highlight the behavioural contributors to the incident. Research has found that interventions affecting risk judgements and fear produce self-protective behaviour. An extension of our STOP.THINK brand is the Impilo Yethu print medium comic strip communication platform. Impilo Yethu was originally created with a predominant focus on safety related issues at work, but has since broadened its mandate with an additional focus on safety at home, protecting the environment, lifestyle choices and general health. Impilo Yethu is used in the mornings in toolbox talks to brief and educate employees on site. SMS is another key medium of communication, used to establish membership of an Impilo Yethu club and communicate HSE messages. The Group has created a database of more than 10 000 mobile telephone numbers from club membership and previous entries into Impilo Yethu competitions. Early morning SMS messages to employees will reinforce core messages such as "Don't forget to STOP.THINK today!" or "Don't forget to hook up today!" This initiative forms part of a long term process to reach out to the entire workforce and generate awareness and feedback.
Development of a stronger HSE culture is anticipated, where understanding and management of HSE challenges are part of normal daily activity. Interactions, observations and audits A variety of workplace interactions, observations and audits are to be implemented to encourage all employees to STOP.THINK and act safely. These should lead to immediate corrective action to eliminate hazardous acts or environments. Two components critical to improving employees' awareness of their safety behaviour are:
Murray & Roberts will confirm the effectiveness of health and safety systems and employee awareness through the appointment of a chief safety officer and by conducting workplace condition audits, specific issue based audits and management systems audits. This will involve the introduction of an objective and reliable corporate led internal audit process that will form the basis of continuous improvement in health and safety practices across the Group. It is envisaged that these audits will be conducted by cross functional teams across operating entities and their sites or branches. To establish an effective internal audit process, Murray & Roberts will introduce a comprehensive set of health and safety management safety standards that will cover:
Occupational and societal health The health of our people is central to our business success. If we are to succeed in our journey towards zero harm, we need to understand the potential for health risks and establish suitable mitigation measures. We can only achieve this through shared responsibility between management and employees, contractors and their families. Hearing loss is a major occupational health risk and 65 (2008:103) new cases were recorded in the year. The Group has engaged specialised service providers to assist with mitigation initiatives to design out pollution zones and dampen machinery noise. Employees are provided with continuous training and education for this serious hazard, as well as appropriate personal protective equipment (PPE). The majority of operations have installed extensive societal health programs, including random substance abuse tests and voluntary HIV/AIDS tests. The Group's risk-based HIV/AIDS policy promotes voluntary testing, non-discrimination and awareness about preventing the spread of the disease and mitigating its effects. This is aimed at a further reduction in the incidence of societal health problems. Of the 7 841 drug and alcohol tests conducted, 4,6% (2008: 3%) returned positive. These employees receive counselling on the negative effects of substance abuse. The Group's health model was reviewed during the year and major health risks identified for each operating environment were:
Preventative and corrective mitigation measures are being implemented to eliminate the underlying causes and hazards of all health risks. Training and the use of PPE contributes to a reduction in the impact of health risks. The Group introduced an employee wellness program (EWP) during the year and is committed to creating a caring and supportive working environment that is people-centred and people-driven. The Murray & Roberts EWP is designed to assist employees experiencing personal and/or work-related difficulties and to ensure optimal performance by employees. |
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