The Bulletin
HEA LTH + SAFETY
From health and safety manager, Joanna Hancock and Crystal Holmes, technical assistant.
update
Updated BFFF H&S pledge BFFF has published the updated Health & Safety pledge for members in line with the HSE’s revised strategy for the sector. We are delighted to have engagement from so many members to our current pledge — circa 80 members — and would encourage as many as possible to get involved. It’s free to join and helps to demonstrate commitment to reducing incidents and improving overall health and safety in the workplace. The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has recently produced its revised strategy for our sector which will cover a five year period from 2016 to 2021. The revised strategy builds on previous success by focussing on delivering measureable improvements against four key objectives. The outlined objectives aim to accelerate reduction in ill health and injury rates. Currently the food and drink manufacturing sector has over twice the average injury rate as other manufacturing sectors, and the BFFF pledge supports the HSE strategy in trying to combat this. Our sector needs to focus on effective workforce engagement and show commitment to leadership to reduce ill health and injuries in the workplace. The four key strategic objectives for our industry, as outlined in our pledge, are: 1. 2. 3. 4.
Ill health / injury reduction Effective management of musculoskeletal disorders (MSD) Effective management of slips and trips Occupational health.
Members signing the BFFF Health & Safety pledge are encouraged to commit to the outlined values to:
●● Demonstrate leadership and effective workforce engagement ●● Comply with all current health and safety legislation, codes of practice and industry standards ●● Provide a safe and healthy environment for their employees and all persons affected by their undertaking via cooperation, consultation, training and review ●● Compile an action plan for key industry objective to: —— Reduce accidents and incidents of ill health —— Effectively manage Musculoskeletal Disorder (MSD) risks —— Effectively manage slip and trip risks —— Deploy an effective occupational health management system ●● Benchmark their company’s health and safety performance with set targets and confidentially share their annual statistics with BFFF
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●● Collaborate and share best practice case studies as a means of improving the health and safety performance of the industry. The reviewed BFFF H&S pledge reflects the new HSE strategy and the objectives. We hope to encourage members to take an active part in the reduction of ill health within the workplace and improve health and safety across the sector. BFFF is a member of the HSE’s working party to deliver the strategy and would like to encourage as many members as possible to take part. We would like to thank all of the BFFF membership that have been part of the pledge so far, and look forward to working with those and more in the future. To get involved, please email crystalholmes@bfff.co.uk.