NATS strikes gold at health and safety awards

NATS, the UK’s leading provider of air traffic services and solutions, has been awarded its second consecutive Gold award in the prestigious Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents (RoSPA) Occupational Health and Safety Awards 2013.

Held at the Birmingham Metropole Hilton Hotel in May, the annual awards recognise companies that reach a stringent, benchmarked standard of excellence.

Entrants are judged on their accident records and strength of their health and safety management systems, as well as leadership and workforce involvement.

Collecting the award on behalf of the NATS team, Garry Jackson, Training and Simulation Director, said: “This award pays testament to our hard work and professionalism, recognising that our systems and processes really are best in class.”

Colin Mooney, Safety, Fire and Environment Manager added: “We are confident in how well we manage health and safety throughout NATS and this award demonstrates the effectiveness of what we do.

“Our incident rate is very low, especially when considering the high-risk nature of some of the jobs that our staff are involved in, including working on active airfields or repairing mountain-top radar stations.”

“Our aim has always been to keep things as intuitive as possible while maintaining a robust system, so it’s great to see that work acknowledged with such a top award.”

RoSPA Awards Manager, David Rawlins said of the win: “The RoSPA firmly believes that organisations that demonstrate ongoing commitment to improvement in accident and ill health prevention deserve recognition. NATS has shown such commitment and we are therefore delighted to honour them with this award.”

The health and safety standards of NATS were given further recognition recently when two NATS bases – Corporate and Technical Centre (CTC) in Fareham and the Prestwick Centre in Scotland – were awarded OHSAS 18001 certification, an international occupational health and safety management system specification.

The process for gaining certification is exceptionally thorough, involving several external audits to verify standards prior to being awarded. Regular verification audits also take place on a continuous basis to ensure the required standards are maintained or improved upon.