Engineering firm's record for workplace safety is no accident

Published by

Peter Davison

From left, with RoSPA’s accolade, Trant Engineering’s Tim Bullen, Gerry Somers (Managing Director), Andy Lilof, Alistair Parker, Leanne Wink, Brian Ormiston and Susan Froggett

Solent engineering firm Trant Engineering has been recognised by The Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents as an industry leader in health and safety practice for the 35th consecutive year.

The Southampton-based company, established in 1958, has 1,000 employees and works in high-risk infrastructure environments in the UK and overseas.

Clients include ExxonMobil, Southern Water, the Ministry of Defence, Portsmouth Water, National Grid, Wessex Water and Magnox.

Trant Engineering is one of less than a handful of companies in the UK to have received so many consecutive awards by RoSPA for high standards in health and safety.

RoSPA Health and Safety Awards is the largest occupational health and safety awards programme in the UK, with nearly 2,000 entries every year, covering nearly 50 countries and a reach of seven million-plus employees.

The programme recognises organisations’ commitment to continuous improvement in the prevention of accidents and ill health at work, looking at entrants’ overarching health and safety management systems, including practices such as leadership and workforce involvement.

While most awards are non-competitive, recognising individual organisations’ achievements , competitive awards are presented in 20 industry sectors and for specialist areas of health and safety management.

Gerry Somers, Managing Director for Trant Engineering, said: “This is a fantastic result for Trant Engineering and absolute recognition of the relentless work being carried out behind the scenes by all parts of the business.

“Our ‘Safety for Life’ and ‘Cultural Development Programme’ within Trant Engineering are continuously driving a positive safety culture across the company.”

Julia Small, RoSPA’s Achievements Director, said: “Accidents at work and work-related ill health don’t just have huge financial implications or cause major disruption – they significantly impact an individual’s quality of life. That’s why good safety performance deserves to be recognised and rewarded.

“We are thrilled that Trant Engineering Ltd has won a RoSPA Award and would like to congratulate them on showing an unwavering commitment to keeping their employees, clients and customers safe from accidental harm and injury.”

Established in 1958 and with a turnover of £145m, Trant Engineering works on long-term framework contracts and capital expenditure projects in the UK, Singapore, Falkland Islands, Ascension Island and Channel Islands.

Peter Davison

Peter Davison is deputy editor of The Business Magazine. He has spent his life in journalism – doing work experience in newsrooms in and around Bristol while still at school, and landing his first job on a local newspaper aged 19. By 28 he was the youngest newspaper editor in the country. An early advocate of online news, he spent the first years of the 2000s telling his bosses that the internet posed both the biggest opportunity and greatest threat to the newspaper industry and the art of journalism. He was right on both counts. Since 2006 he has enjoyed a career as a freelance journalist. He lives in rural Wiltshire with one wife, two children, and three cats.