AG has re-affirmed the importance of health and safety to its 230-strong workforce with its annual safety campaign and ‘Safe Day’.
The specialist building products business, which has manufacturing locations in Fivemiletown, Toome, Carryduff, and Pomeroy, chose Health and Safety as its core employee engagement theme throughout October.
During the campaign, the firm held its annual ‘Safe Day’, where production across each of AG’s sites was temporarily suspended to enable employees to concentrate on the subject.
The initiative, led by CEO Stephen Acheson, and the Health, Safety and Environment team at AG, encourages staff to “make safety personal” by focusing on the health and safety risks across all AG sites.
The session centred around the promotion of physical safety on sites, as well as mental wellbeing. A host of speakers covered everything from emergency first aid, mental resilience, unlocking potential, and nutrition. There was even some yoga.
A number of exhibitors also joined in the event, offering employees health checks, hearing checks, and advice on issues such as physical fitness, skin care, and cancer prevention,
The event also raised money for the Air Ambulance Northern Ireland charity.
As a third-generation family-owned business AG wanted to promote its values through this intensive programme, which included sessions on Personal Responsibility, Mental Health, Transport, Traffic Management and Pedestrian Segregation, and Isolation and Lockout of machinery and equipment.
HSEQ Manager Cathy Maguire said: “This campaign aimed to focus on the prevention of fatal accidents that are responsible for 94% of deaths in our industry. We need to ensure that all employees, contractors and visitors always leave our premises in the same healthy and safe way in which they arrived. We can only achieve this aim if we each take personal responsibility for safety.
“While SafeDay was a tremendous success that has attracted a lot of very positive feedback across all our sites, our emphasis on health and safety continues all year round. Our staff are encouraged to report any hazards immediately through our ‘good catch’ programme via our Engage app.?We want everyone at AG to?always go home safe to their loved ones each day.”
CEO Stephen Acheson added: “Our employee’s wellbeing is one of our core values at AG. Safety is essential and must be managed to avoid, reduce or (at the very least) control risk. It is the most crucial investment we can make.
“The objective for AG’s SafeDay campaign is to help make safety personal. We want to encourage ‘good catches’ and hazard spotting as part of everyday work practice and run a range of initiatives throughout the year. We have made great progress in improving health and safety practices across the business and will continue to develop this positive culture into the future.”
