Wellbeing

We know that it is in our economic interests to support the wellbeing of our employees, and that's why we are constantly improving our efforts in this area. We believe that investing in the health of our employees leads to reduced absenteeism and work related injuries, and increases our ability to attract and retain employees.

How we support our employees' wellbeing

We recognise that, as the proportion of our older workers grows, the diseases related to ageing will become more prevalent in our workplaces. So in response to this challenge, we have developed active programmes to enhance the health of our employees and contractors.

A study involving some 1,300 of our employees in Australia led to the planned introduction of "wellness" programmes to tackle issues such as sedentary lifestyles, psychological health, nutrition, pain management and fatigue.  And, given the link between fatigue and safety, all of our businesses where people do safety critical jobs are now encouraged to run fatigue management programmes.

To date, 94 per cent of our employees work in operations where a health and wellness programme has been implemented to target the conditions that are most costly to our business.

At most of our sites, employees have regular medical check-ups where they can discuss any issues affecting their weight and blood pressure, or get advice on suitable exercise programmes.

We are also benchmarking our performance in this area against other leading companies, and building a business case for active wellness programmes that are core to the prevention of the newer illnesses such as stress and musculo-skeletal conditions. 

Our results

Our 2006 results show that the most serious causes of lost working days were fatigue and low energy - the ailments that most directly affect safety.