Speaking to SHP in the June issue, he said: “If we don’t do something fundamentally different to what is currently happening in our industry, we will have fatalities, we will have RIDDORs, we will have high impacts of health incidents, and we will have lots of minor accidents and near misses and that can’t be allowed to happen.
“Even if we measure ourselves as being a little bit better than what’s gone before us that will still happen, so clearly it’s not acceptable… The only safety performance that we can absolutely put our heart on saying we are happy with is zero incidents, zero harm and we won’t compromise on that.”
In his presentation, Mr Howells will outline Thames Tideway Tunnel’s sustainable active safety (SAS) programme, which has been designed to reflect the 10-year lifetime of the project.
He will also tell delegates about its innovative project induction and safety engagement, both of which will inform the workforce of the team’s expectations and the safety culture across the gargantuan development.
Mr Howells will highlight another project innovation – the immersive induction programme, part of which will be held at Thames Tideway Tunnel’s purpose-built employee project induction centre (EPIC).
“I have a very strong belief that if we truly want people to be part of a project or company, they have got to feel part of that,” he said in the exclusive interview with SHP this month.
“The programme involves very early safety engagement (EaSE), so understanding exactly what our aspirations are, the things we are looking to achieve as part of the project, but more importantly it is to gain feedback from our teams very early on to help us shape and develop our programme based on their previous experiences.”
Steve Howells will be presenting Thames Tideway Tunnel’s triple zero vision at 12.10 in track A
