Forecourt services and equipment supplier TSG UK has been fully immersing its customers and contractors in its health and safety strategy through an initiative which ran throughout September, called SAFEtember.

The programme saw a month of events, competitions and communications reaching the 235 members of TSG UK. Each week it covered four key topics: Health and Wellbeing, Respiratory Illness, Mental Health and Driving Safety. The HSSE team, along with the senior management team, created a month-long initiative including, daily focus points, six roadshows across the country.

Andy Wallace, operations manager at TSG UK, explained: "H&S is our number one priority. We have long had a central philosophy of ’Go Home Safe’ - a mantra that we use to signify, not only the importance we put on our employees going home safely each day, but even more importantly, to ensure our employees think about the ramifications were they not to. We encourage them to think about their personal lives, loved ones, friends and their hobbies, all the things important to them, that would be adversely affected should they have an accident at work. We find that this messaging helps people concentrate in the dangerous environment that they are working in.

’SAFEtember was launched to further instill these messages and to ensure everyone at TSG UK gets to hear our full commitment to their safety, face to face.’

Neil Farmer, HSSE Manager at TSG UK, said: "Although the H&S message is clear throughout our sites and our daily communication with our teams, our aim for SAFEtember was to get in front of every employee of TSG UK and ensure they understand our commitment to H&S and our motto of ’Go Home Safe’ – which is exactly what it did.

"Part of the Respiratory Illness discussions highlighted issues at work, but also that these measures also apply when you’re at home, carrying out DIY for instance, and Driving Safety focused on our drive to and from work, when we’re more likely to ’switch off’ and not follow procedures enforced at work."

Dave Hill, HSSE Manager and Mental Health First Aider at TSG UK, said: "During our SAFEtember roadshows, mental health and health and wellbeing - two topics that link together – have been heavily focused upon. Highlighting symptoms, encouraging conversation on the statistics and helping our employees to understand that they’re not alone, and how to help their colleagues."