We are committed to the Group achieving the highest standards of health and safety. We have set ourselves stretching improvement targets at the organisation and employee levels.

An integral part of the move to a regional organisation over the past year has been to establish regional as well as Group level health and safety forums. These forums are chaired by members of our Group Executive Committee with the aim of driving improvements in health and safety performance through the sharing of best practice and the setting of specific regional objectives.

The Group Executive Committee receives regular updates on health and safety initiatives from across the Group, which includes a review of all lost time accidents. Formal quarterly reporting of health and safety performance is provided to the Board, together with an annual health and safety performance review.

Our Group wide health and safety management processes are based on the application of risk management techniques and on the Occupational Health and Safety Management Standard OHSAS18001:2007. Our UK business has held the OHSAS18001 standard since 2003, with our Italian business gaining certification in 2009. Further, international businesses are working towards certification in the next financial year.

During 2009 we concentrated on reinvigorating our health and safety management processes, with the senior management team providing high profile leadership. This was supported by the introduction of behavioral safety methodologies in the business, safety training for managers and employees, and tight management and control of physical hazards such as the completion of the major fire safety upgrade to the French warehouse.

We measure our health and safety performance by financial year. In 2010, the Group’s lost time accident ratio reduced by 18% to 0.98 lost time accidents per 200,000 hours worked, which was consistent with a 24% reduction in the total number of reported lost time accidents.

There was an increase in our ‘All Accident’ rate for 2010, although this represented an increase of less than 1% in the total number of accidents reported over 2009. The most common accident causes continue to be manual handling activities and slips, trips and falls, which are consistent with a distribution business and our previous experience.

For 2011, the Group has set itself a lost time accident target of 0.60 lost time accidents per 200,000 hours, to be achieved by building on the initiatives launched during the previous year.

Health and Safety KPIs 2010 2009
Lost time accidents* per 200,000 hours worked 0.98 1.20
‘All Accidents’ per 200,000 hours worked 7.33 6.61

* Lost time accidents are those where the employee is off work and fails to return to work for at least 24 hours