Workplace health and safety can be seen as the foundation of all of Pickles’ values. We see ourselves as a family and it is paramount that we ensure that our practices protect the health and safety of every member of our staff, as well as our environment.
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We expanded our Workplace Health and Safety (WHS) department in 2013 with a National Work Health Safety Environment Manager and five state-based Safety Officers. We selected this team based on their broad and diverse safety backgrounds that included insurance, mining, oil and gas, electrical, logistics, recruitment and warehousing.
This team promotes the health and safety culture and wellbeing of all staff, contractors, visitors and stakeholders. Their work includes policy development, consultation and review, creation of our WHS vision statement, setting objectives and targets across the business, and all WHS training nationally. The team is extremely proactive about improving Pickles’ safety culture via monthly national toolbox talks, safety alerts, safe act observations, risk assessments, internal audits, workplace inspections, safe work instructions, take-five and committee meetings. In addition to these proactive measures, the team reviews all hazard, incident and near-miss reports, looking for trends and developing strategies to continually improve and eliminate risks.
An important part of documenting, tracking and analysing our compliance with WHS standards is our use of a cloud-based solution safety management system, Skytrust. All branches utilise Skytrust for training management, hazard and incident reporting, daily pre-starts for plant, people (teams/ work departments) and equipment to be undertaken by all staff, managing suppliers and sub-contractors. Skytrust gives dashboard-based reporting tools and actionable data to review. We also leverage regular external auditors to verify our compliance with workplace health and safety and environmental best practices.
Pickles has received several accreditations related to safety and environmental protection. Due to our commitment to safety, we have received AS/NZS 4801:2001 Safety Accreditation across all our branches nationally. AS/NZS 4801:2001 is used as the benchmark to assess occupational health and safety management systems in Australia and New Zealand, with standards so rigorous that other countries have adopted the requirements as well.
We also have received our Environmental Management System certificate, reflecting our commitment to environmental risk management using the ISO 14001 International Standard for a structured management approach to environmental protection. These standards safeguard our business strategies now and in the future by protecting resources and ensuring the highest standards are met.
Our people and resources are critical to what we do at Pickles, and we have made a solid commitment to the processes, policies and procedures that protect them. We are proud of the accreditations we have received across our branches nationally and will continue to look for ways to promote a culture of workplace health and safety for our Pickles team and be an industry leader in safety and environment.
29 Jan