Health and safety

Health and safety is a corporate driver at Barhale, always appearing at the top of our agendas at Board meetings and at management meetings at all levels in the company. We believe that Barhale people, and all those who come onto our sites and members of the public, have a right to expect that every effort be made to ensure their safety. At Barhale we believe that a safe environment is not just a place where injuries and incidents do not happen, but also where the risk of an injury or incidenthappening has been managed out.

Senior managers take the lead role in driving the company focus on safety, making personal efforts to enlist the support of all staff in building a positive and proactive health and safety culture. We are committed to seeking continuous improvement in safety performance through the adoption of best practice and close adherence to safety management systems. As part of this process Barhale achieved certification to OHSAS 18001 in October 2003 (as part of our integrated safety, environmental and quality management system) across all of our operations.

Overall responsibility for formulation and review of policy rests with the Board, with implementation entrusted to regional and site managers and ultimately to each employee. Health and safety performance of each Barhale operating unit is closely monitored by the Board and assessed against our own creditable past performance as well as against industry benchmarks through the use of KPI's.

Creating a safe working environment requires formal processes to identify, assess and manage risk across our operations. Full training is given to all employees to ensure that they are capable of doing their jobs in a safe manner and can operate successfully in our culture of safety awareness. Our safety statistics are collated and made public on our website and in other corporate publications.

In order to effect a positive behaviour change, absolute commitment from the top level is crucial. At Barhale, the Board and managers lead by example, senior managers openly and visibly demonstrate their safety commitment, and a culture of safety awareness is promoted throughout all levels of company operations, with continuous feedback and review used to develop and improve upon our existing safety performance. In addition to our measurable safety KPI's, Barhale are pursuing a zero accident culture. This culture follows a set of beliefs, to which we encourage each employee and sub-contractor to adopt at work and at home, as follows:

• All accidents are preventable
• Everyone is responsible for safety
• No task is to be undertaken unless it can be done safely
• Do not compromise on safety
• Never ignore an unsafe act or condition

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