Our commitment to health and safety in the workplace has been reaffirmed with the conclusion of a successful training session for seven members of the HPP team from several departments across our Oldham site.
The day-long course conducted by our long-time training partners, North Lancs Training Group, culminated in an externally-marked exam. The results are now in, and we extend congratulations to Antony Platt, Carl Worral, Jordan Parfitt, Mark Simpson, Rob Kilroy, Steve Bannon and Tony Pilkington for achieving pass grades.
They have each achieved the Highfield Level 2 Award in Health & Safety within the Workplace, which covers essential health and safety workplace practices and provides an understanding of the responsibilities of both employers and employees.
It looks at the benefits of good health and safety, typical hazards and how to reduce workplace accidents, near misses and ill-health, together with an overview of risk assessments and the importance of reporting.
Our focus on health and safety is spearheaded by Stuart Chamberlain, our H&S Officer, who says: "Keeping workplaces safe is both a legal and moral obligation for employers and can have severe consequences if health and safety laws aren't followed.
"The course and the exam are a good starting platform to understand health and safety at work. They're designed to make the candidates aware of their own safety, the safety of their colleagues, customers, contractors, visitors and anyone from the general public we might have on the site."
Topics covered by Thomas Butterly and Stuart Gower, from NLTG, included workplace accidents and ill health, slips and trips, risk assessments, fire safety and manual handling.
The course sits on the government's Regulated Qualifications Framework (RQF) overseen by Ofqual, and lists the benefits as:
- Enhanced safety knowledge
- Compliance with the latest health and safety regulations
- Personal development - enhanced personal skill set
- Creating a safer workplace
Stuart has been HPP's Health and Safety Officer for five years and is a member of the Institution of Occupational Safety and Health (IOSH) that promotes safety and sustainability in the global industry.