HEALTH & SAFETY
One company is offering flexible and practical training opportunities for street cleansing staff to help maintain safer – and more efficient – working practices
Safer working practices are essential while out on the road
Streetwise training for the front line
A
t a time when accidents in the waste indus- try are hitting the headlines, AJF Waste Management is celebrating its role in assist- ing more than 1,800 front-line operators to maintain safer working conditions. Andy Firman, managing director at AJF
Waste Management, says: “We are proud to have played a part in bringing the industry into the 21st century. Awareness of safety issues not only safeguards workers, it also improves logistics and makes collection rounds more effi-
38 Local Authority Waste & Recycling April 2011
cient, so with almost 2,000 trained staff under our belt we are really demonstrating our commitment to making the waste industry a better place. “Training in the sector is sadly lacking, and as far as I am aware, we offer the only modular scheme which can take a new member of staff, including temporary or agency staff all the way from their first day on a collection round, right up to management level. For many operatives, who don’t have the level of skills suitable for large chunks of training, this approach is a manageable way to simply improve safety, or to train for a national qualification like the NVQ.” Colin Smith, works manager in the department of waste and cleansing at Vale of Glamorgan Council, which has worked extensively with AJF Waste Management and engages the company to induct all new members of staff, agrees: “There is a real lack of training opportunities and programmes for street cleansing staff. AJF is flexible in its approach and will tailor a system for our operatives and services, and with Andy Firman’s background, having come from an operational role, he can relate to a lot of the staff and the problems associated with the job.”
There is a real lack of training opportunities and programmes for street cleaning staff
“
Vale of Glamorgan has been working in partnership with AJF for almost three years and all staff, including agency workers, undertake induction
” training before
going out on rounds. The street cleansing course covers a wide range of areas such as manual handling, fly tipping and how to manage sharps, while street collectors tackle safe collections. All staff undertake
the
assistants programme which shows how to correctly manoeuvre and reverse LGV vehicles.
Last winter saw a spate of accidents – some with fatal con- sequences – plaguing the waste management and recycling sector. As the Health & Safety Executive calls for employers to increase steps to safeguard workers, organisations across the industry are looking for ways to improve. Firman says: “We fit all our courses in around service rounds. As demand grows, we are adding more and more courses to our portfolio, but are always happy to design bespoke options. Our most recent course covered the man- agement of clinical waste, and dynamic risk assessment features regularly in our programme.”
www.ajfwastemanagement.co.uk reversing
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