Health and Safety Management in the Budimex Group
As a company from the construction sector, the Budimex Group considers the area of occupational health and safety particularly important. Appropriate regulation and care for observance of the OHS rules is a key element of our responsibility towards employees, as well as other important stakeholders who expect the highest standards from us during execution of contracts. Ensuring safe working conditions for our employees is inscribed in the basic principles of the Budimex Group. The subject of health and safety is one of the main areas of the CSR Strategy 2021-2023.
As of 2019, Budimex has an ISO 45001 certificate – Occupational Health and Safety Management Systems. Mostostal Krakow also has ISO 45001 certification. ISO 45001 implies the commitment of all entities involved in the investment implementation process to create a safe workplace. In addition to management systems, the Budimex Group has “Ferrovial Minimum Standards for Occupational Health and Safety”. Their main message is the organisation of the construction process taking into account the principle that everyone – both employees of Group companies and their business partners – should return to their families and loved ones after finishing work. They emphasise this by saying: “nothing should stop us from respecting the safety rules, for which we must always find time”.
The Budimex Group also has an “Occupational Health and Safety Policy”, which provides for:
Health and Safety Commission and Health and Safety Executive Committee
The Group’s companies have Health and Safety Committees with employee and employer representatives, which represent all employees. Their task is to carry out weekly health and safety inspections on all contracts. Inspection information and recommendations are collected in one place, making them easier to monitor.
In late 2019 and early 2020, in addition to the Health and Safety Committee, the Health and Safety Executive Committee was established at Budimex SA on the initiative of the Branch Directors. According to the plan for 2021, the Committee has met 4 times. A regular item of the Executive Committee is the discussion of Incident Statistics, including accidents, near misses and observations of hazardous situations and behaviours, Visits by Senior Management, Inspections of Health and Safety Services. The Committee set up several working groups during the reporting period with the following tasks:
- analysing the condition of machinery so as to develop solutions to eliminate accidents and update the accident procedure,
- development of Educational Campaigns addressed to the employees of the Budimex Group as well as to Subcontractors in the field of:
- work in the vicinity of machinery,
- work in the vicinity of aboveground and underground installations,
- work at, near or on railways.
Employees from different levels of the organisation are involved in monitoring safety performance. The occupational health and safety services carry out occupational health and safety inspections on contracts and at the head office. The team of internal auditors monitors the correct functioning of the safety system by means of system audits. Compliance of the organisation of work on projects is verified by audits of the Construction Assessment System. As of 2019, a group of Budimex SA’s management staff conducts Senior Management Visits, which are aimed at building a safety culture at all levels of the organisation.