Being serious about safety is good for business
Chantal Hemphill, Health, Safety & Environmental Manager at Phoenix Natural Gas, outlines the positive impact of the company’s focus on safety for not only its employees but its customers and wider community.
Phoenix Natural Gas celebrates 20 years as a leading distributor of natural gas in Northern Ireland next year. During that time it has been recognised for excellence as a world leading energy utility, whilst in the process making natural gas available to around 40 per cent of the population in Northern Ireland.
Phoenix has been the major contributor in building a natural gas industry in Northern Ireland from scratch, and to date the company has invested over £500 million in what remains one of only a few gas networks in the world built entirely through private investment.
Whilst the natural gas industry is subject to stringent safety legislation governing all areas; from the design and manufacture stage right through to the installation and safe use of gas appliances, adopting a high profile and focused safety culture throughout the company makes good commercial sense. Safety is at the forefront of all Phoenix’s activities and as an organisation, Phoenix has a fundamental objective to ensure the integrity of the gas network, ensuring a safe environment to employees, contractors and the wider community.
The impact of this focus on excellence in Health, Safety and Environmental performance is quite remarkable; annual staff health checks, promotion of health initiatives and workplace assessments led to zero incidents of occupational ill health in 2014.
The continued safety and integrity of the gas distribution network is integral to business performance and the sustained effort resulted in a 5 per cent decrease in third party damages to the network year on year.
The British Safety Council presented Phoenix with a prestigious International Safety Award for protecting its employees from the risk of injury and ill health at work. These annual awards celebrate organisations from around the world that have demonstrated to the satisfaction of the scheme’s independent judges their commitment to preventing workplace injuries and work-related ill health during the 2014 calendar year.
Lynda Armstrong OBE, Chair of the Trustees of the British Safety Council, congratulated Phoenix Natural Gas on their success in winning an International Safety Award with merit for 2015. She said: “The British Safety Council commends Phoenix Natural Gas on their achievement. The award is in recognition of their commitment and effort to keep their employees and workplaces free of injury and ill health.
“The British Safety Council’s vision is that no one should be injured or made ill by work, anywhere in the world. Across all of the winning organisations are examples of dedication and hard work to ensure that the risk of injury and ill health is prevented. We commend the winning organisations and urge them to continue working with us to ensure that our vision becomes a reality.”
Chantal Hemphill, Health and Safety manager of Phoenix Natural Gas collected the award and commented: “We are delighted to have achieved this International Safety Award in recognition of our outstanding health and safety practices.
“Natural gas has been established as the fuel of choice and demand continues to be strong, our staff continue to work hard to ensure that health and safety remains our top business objective. This award goes to underpin our continued investment in this area and our commitment to maintaining the highest standards.”
Phoenix Natural Gas
197 Airport Road West
Belfast, BT3 9ED
Tel: 03454 55 55 55
Web: www.phoenixnaturalgas.com
