Occupational Health and Safety Policy

Sysco Ireland is committed to implementing the highest standards of health and safety throughout our business in order to provide and maintain a safe environment for our colleagues, visitors, customers, contractors, and members of the public. Our key objective is to prevent injury and ill-health, ensuring everyone goes home safely, while preserving and promoting existing safety, health, and wellbeing.

It is a particular priority for us to prevent all incidents linked to our main risk areas – manual handling, vehicle and equipment operation and slips, trips, falls. We will also continue to review new and emerging risks such as Covid19 and hybrid working, applying control measures as appropriate, giving priority to the general principles of prevention and hierarchy of controls.

We will manage health and safety hazards and risks i!1 compliance with all legislative requirements, codes of practice and industry technical advances. We will aim to achieve this, so far as is reasonably practicable by:

– Encouraging and promoting a positive safety culture within our organisation.
– Managing manual handling activities, ensuring appropriate risk prevention measures are in place.
– Planning machinery, equipment, and vehicle movements, ensuring the safety of both pedestrians and operators/drivers always.
– Establishing hygiene policies, resources, and safe systems of work to prevent slips, trips and falls.
– Managing risks linked with driving for work, display screen equipment and office ergonomics.
– Consulting staff on health and safety matters that affect them, including risk identification, control selection, training, and emergency plan preparations.
– Providing necessary feedback mechanisms from colleagues to management through safety representation, safety committee meetings, hazard reporting programs and safety inspections.
– Conducting risk assessments to identify all known hazards. Control measures will be appropriate for the hazard identified and will be communicated to relevant colleagues through safe systems of work.
– Where risks cannot be controlled, they will be reduced to as low as reasonably practicable and continually reviewed. As a last resort, personal protective equipment of the highest standard will be made available at no cost to colleagues to complete duties safely.
– Providing appropriate training, information, instruction, and supervision necessary to complete all necessary tasks safely and allowing adequate funding and time resources to ensure said training is proportionate to the risk involved.
– Providing appropriate vehicles and equipment that are regularly serviced and maintained for work activities. These will also be inspected at required intervals in line with regulations.
– Assessing the competence of any contractor utilised by the company and where necessary specialist knowledge will be sought to ensure full competence in all health and safety matters.
– Preparing emergency plans and communicating these to all staff, contractors, and visitors.
– Striving for continuous improvements within our health and safety performance.