Hi all,

Reinforcing our commitment to Zero Harm and a “Think Safe, Act Safe, Home Safe” culture

The beginning of February saw a high risk near miss incident on one of our Sydney construction sites involving an apprentice. The safety alert distributed in response to the incident can be viewed at the following link:

As I’ve said to our teams and acknowledged with our client in regard to this incident, our ability to keep our people safe and uphold a strong safety track record is what gives us our licence to operate. It is the critical component, beyond our capabilities and expertise, that allows our clients to trust us to safely deliver our work in what can be high risk environments. It is also important to remember, where we are engaged as a subcontractor, which is often the case, our actions on site including our performance on safety has a direct impact, positive or otherwise, on our client’s reputation.

While not arising from a great circumstance, the incident has presented a good opportunity to reflect on these points and reinforce the responsibility each of us have to upholding our “Think Safe, Act Safe, Home Safe” culture as defined in our guiding principles:

• You have a safety mindset by keeping yourself and others safe.
• You cooperate and comply with all safe systems of work and instructions.
• You call out unsafe and harmful work practices and behaviours.
• You assess, understand and control hazards and risks.
  

I must stress at Star Group we have a good culture around the reporting of incidents. We’re all responsible for encouraging and continually improving on that culture. If we don’t report, we don’t have the ability to learn from an incident, to take action and put controls in place to help ensure that incident doesn’t happen again across the Group.

Looking ahead to this month, a safety reset is underway across our sites with a focus on re-inducting our people into two revised standard operating procedures (SOPs) as well as reviewing and updating site specific Safe Work Method Statements (SWMS) in conjunction with the work groups across the business. We’re also focussing on a revised safety assurance program with an aim to increase management visibility and engagement on our sites and workplaces.

New business
On the new business front, for January and February a congratulations to our Service business who have had a strong start to the year across both our Condell Park and City branches. Key wins include a statewide switchboard upgrade project for TAFE NSW and fit out works at Grosvenor Place in the Sydney CBD with Built.

As touched on in my last update, we continue to track and tender on a diversified pipeline of work across sectors.

Client satisfaction
It’s been great to see the positive feedback continue this year from our clients on several recently completely engagements. A shout out to the teams involved in the Chifley enabling works, Goulburn Police Academy, University of Sydney RMSB upgrade and our Hunter Water crew, in particular Matt Murphy and James Sandall.

Cheers,
John 

John Andrews
Group CEO