Sustainability Report 2006/07Health and safety
Poor safety performance
Melbourne Water’s safety performance in 2007/08 was very disappointing, with a relatively high number of serious health and safety incidents compared with previous years. The worst incident was at our Brooklyn pumping station in February when an electric arc explosion occurred as one of our people, system controller George Vagias, reinstated a high voltage circuit breaker.
George suffered severe burns to 60% of his body, some permanent hearing loss as well as a broken leg, resulting in hospitalisation for about three months. Upon discharge in May, he began a comprehensive rehabilitation program including laser treatment of his burns and was still off work at 30 June 2008. Melbourne Water offered him, his family and colleagues every possible support and we will continue to do so. He is due to return to work well before the end of 2008.
Investigations into the cause of the incident included power industry experts, but no explanation had been established at 30 June 2008. Further detailed investigation workshops are scheduled for July 2008.
Immediately after the incident, all similar Melbourne Water circuit breakers were examined. We modified our procedures to ensure that all of them are double-isolated before they are operated.
We did not achieve our goal of zero lost time injuries (LTIs) for 2007/08, with two LTIs affecting our employees – however, this is one less than last year.
Of major concern to Melbourne Water were also serious contractor incidents. Our contractors had four LTIs – double the number of last year. These included an incident at Prospect Hill retarding basin, Narre Warren, where a contractor working in a manhole suffered a broken leg.
In each case, Melbourne Water worked closely with the contract company to investigate the incident and instigate required changes. We have included systemic improvements in our Health and Safety Improvement Plan (see below).
Our combined LTI frequency rate (taking into account employees and contractors) increased from 2.8 at the end of June 2007 to 3.6 at the end of June 2008. Operations were able to continue without significant disruption.
Improvement plan
A 2008-10 Health and Safety Improvement Plan was developed after a survey of employee and management representatives (including our maintenance partners) identified specific areas for improvement.
The survey found that a general improvement was required to reinvigorate our health and safety focus in the face of significant business challenges over the coming years. A workshop was held in April involving members of all our Health and Safety Committees and including representatives from our major contractors. Some 65 improvement actions were identified.
These actions, which took into account an analysis of the incidents in early 2008, included:
- Holding people to their health and safety accountabilities
- Improving hazard identification assessment and control
- Developing additional measures of our health and safety performance, with action plans to address trends
- Ensuring that our alliance partners are able to meet or exceed our own health and safety standards
- Providing appropriate information, education and training in health and safety
- Increasing positive recognition for people who report incidents and hazards.
Surveillance audit
Melbourne Water’s safety management system, The Safe Way, includes policy, safety monitoring, management procedures, performance standards and task-based instructions and forms.
The system was introduced in 2006/07 and aligns with the Victorian WorkSafe auditing tool, SafetyMAP. Lloyd’s undertook a surveillance audit of Melbourne Water in April, and found no non-conformances. It followed the three-year SafetyMAP recertification achieved in June 2007.