Last week saw Sisk’s 'Respect our road workers' campaign take place in support of the first national 'Respect Our Workforce Week' led by Safer Highways and the Think Respect campaign. This article looks back at the week.
According to Think Respect, 60% of road workers suffer abuse daily - yet most cases go unreported. The campaign was designed to raise awareness of the verbal and physical abuse suffered by road workers across the UK and to encourage those witnessing abuse – be it the worker themselves, a colleague or a member of the wider public – to report it. It was also designed to challenge ourselves, the construction industry, to look at ways we can improve our operations to avoid potentially confrontational situations arising.
Last Monday, all our civils sites across the UK conducted a site safety stand down. The teams were given a presentation that highlighted the issues faced, along with watching the campaign video and receiving a toolbox talk and guidance for conflict avoidance. The sessions ended with an open conversation, where workers shared their personal experiences, discussed common issues and identified areas where we could improve.
On the same day, we ran a virtual stand down for our civils supply chain. These sessions resulted in some fantastic open dialogue, stressing the importance of reporting any incidents of worker abuse and ways in which the industry can talk to the public and work together to facilitate better understanding to avoid situations where abuse could occur.
Then last Tuesday and Thursday, our team were out in Sheffield and York – two sites where we have significant projects ongoing – to open conversations with the general public around road worker abuse. Kelly Sowden, Regional Social Value and Stakeholder Manager at Sisk, comments: “We spoke to a lot of people, and it was a really good way of raising the awareness of the challenges road workers face every day. In particular, reinforcing the message that there are humans behind the high-vis and that abuse can impact health, both mentally and physically.”
Throughout the week, the team also supported Safer Highways and National Highways in a series of public engagement events across the East of England.
One theme that was raised during our engagement was that of emergency services who have been seen on occasion to speed through the works on blue lights with limited thought towards the workers at the roadside. The police, who attended our one of our briefings this week, agreed they should not be putting our teams at risk by speeding.
Kevin Robinson, founder and Campaign Director of Stamp It Out and Think Respect, comments on the success of the week. “Stamp it Out is proud of the impact which the inaugural Respect our workforce week has had with both BBC and ITV coverage on both a local and national level.
This is in no small part due to the phenomenal support we have received from across the supply chain from many organisations.
One of those organisations, Sisk, have truly stepped up to the plate, not only with a series of community engagement events but also in disseminating the message across their own workforce and supply chain.
The support we have received from Sisk has been outstanding and the top-down leadership adopted from civils Managing Director Dominic Hodges is something which other organisations should look to as a blueprint for how they demonstrate to those we put to work that we truly care about their wellbeing in the face of abuse.”
Dominic Hodges, Sisk UK Civils Managing Director, summarises his thoughts looking back at the week. “This week was fantastic in raising awareness of the campaign. It’s been great to see our site teams and our supply chain so engaged. Our teams were out across the UK building awareness with the wider public too, so it’s been a good educational project. It’s opened up the conversation to drive positive change, which is one of the key campaign aims.
"We are clear that this is not the end of a week of activities, but the start of a journey. Road workers provide a key service in sometimes challenging situations – like every other worker across all industries, they don’t deserve to suffer abuse. They are simply doing their job. That is why our campaign message has been ‘think respect’”.
The campaign has been well received by road workers, our clients and our supply chain, with many comments received praising our dedicated efforts towards ensuring the safety and respect of workers on the front lines of our infrastructure projects. Sisk would like to thank each and every person that contributed to or attended our events to help make the week a success.
Into the future, we’ll keep pushing the message that abuse of road workers should not be tolerated. At the same time, we’ll be reviewing all the comments and feedback received to identify ways in which we can make our work sites safer and how we can better communicate with the public to prevent confrontational situations occurring.