The IOSH’s No Time to Lose campaign was launched in 2014 in order to raise awareness amongst industry workers about occupational cancer. The campaign is spread around the world and provides businesses with free and useful resources to protect their workforce against and minimise the risks. The high-profile campaign has reached a new height as it has had their 100th organisation sign up in order to pledge their support to raising awareness about work-related cancers. This milestone has been reached after Wills Bros Civil Engineering Ltd signed up to the No Time to Lose pledge that includes a six-part plan that covers the important actions of organisations that are wanting to manage the exposure to carcinogens within their workplace. The action plan can be accessed by those who are planning to make changes as well as those who are already in the middle of addressing the exposure risks.   The Executive Director of Policy at IOSH, Shelly Frost has been part of the announcement of the 100th pledger during last week’s Global Asbestos Awareness Week. It has been estimated that 666,000 deaths each year worldwide are in connection to cancer that can be related back to causes from work. The biggest killer as part of this figure is asbestos, but other carcinogens such as diesel fumes, silica dust and solar radiation are also causes of workplace cancers. It is thought that through the use of the campaign and the efforts of the pledged businesses that now nearly half a million employees around the world are aware of the carcinogens mentioned above that they could come into contact with through their jobs. Although it is great to see that the campaign is expanding, there is still a lot more work that needs to be done in order to significantly reduce deaths due to carcinogen exposure in the workplace. It has been announced that next year the campaign will be releasing free resources in order to help businesses around the world raise awareness of as well as manage the exposure risk of asbestos. The campaign aims to get rid of occupational cancer.

Highways England has announced Multi-million pounds of road improvements in order to help with the development of 4,000 homes and more than 10,900 jobs. These improvements are expected to cost £75 million and the improvements by Highways England should create opportunities around Derby and Daventry in the Midlands as well as Oldham in the North West, Durham in the North East and Taunton in the South West. As part of these project, Highways England will be contributing £12.45 million contribution as part of its Growth and Housing Fund. The rest of the £75 million cost will be coming from private sector developer contributions as well as other public funding. The Growth and Housing Fund is the Government’s £100 million fund set aside as part of the £15 billion investment in the road network. The Fund will provide funding for road improvements that are necessary for new developments intended to create homes and jobs in order to try and meet the demand. It has also been announced that Highways England has set out a plan that will use Government funding in order to create the largest impact over the long-term on the countries network of motorways and major A roads. It is important that these road systems are kept up to a high standard because they contribute to the country’s economic wellbeing. This ‘The Road to Growth’ plan is a way to manage the growth of the economy through the improvement of infrastructure like roads. Highways England also has plans to publish 128 ‘Route Strategies’ which includes all key road routes around England. The strategies will review the key routes, noting their performances and constraints in order to identify where needs further study or where improvements can be made. England’s Major roads are vital as part of the economic growth of the country as t provides a connection for businesses and people. The more efficient this connection is, the better for the economy.

UK Power Networks have selected six contractors as part of the projects to refurbish and upgrade the electrical infrastructure across the South East of England and East Anglia. One of the contractors that has been awarded the works is SPIE UK. The company has been awarded a noteworthy Wood Pole Overhead Line framework. The project is initially set to be two years but has a four plus two-year extension for their project. The contract awarded to SPIE is part of the £920 million investment project that has been taken on by UK Power Networks. In the first year of the project SPIE will be on site in the East of England, outside of Colchester. From here the company will manage the design as well as the planning of the projects that are associated with the overhead distribution system. The subsidiary of SPIE Group is an independent company and European leader in multi-technical services. Focusing on the areas of energy and communications, the company provides energy, safety and environmentally focused solutions for their clients. SPIE UK employs more than 3,000 staff and also work from a variety of different regional offices around the UK. SPIE’s main focus will be on the wooden poles that support the cables that will be running from 230 Volts up to and including 132,000 volts. The intention behind the project is to keep the lights on for 3.5 million homes as well as businesses across the East of England by updating and replacing the cables. The overall project will see the replacement, refurbishment, and construction of a variety of different overhead lines as well as pole inspections, changes and some terminations. UK Power Network will also use SPIE as their storm response team throughout the year. The expertise required for the updating project are provided by SPIE and the project should improve the performance and capability of the electricity network.

The region on the outskirts of the area of Uttoxeter is going through a major improvement period and Sykes Pumps are in the thick of the building and construction repairs that will enable the fixing to take place. Their presence is due to the intentions of Staffordshire County Council to try and improve the often congested and oft-used A50 motorway that runs not far off from Uttoxeter, and Sykes Pumps have been commissioned to ensure that the water that the repairs produce during the digging up and refurbishments to the land do not ruin and swamp the project. In order for this to happen, an efficient pumping system needs to be put into place and it is evident that Sykes Pumps’ wide range of experience in the field of water circulation makes them perfect for the job. Indeed, their work is vital to the successful running of this enterprise which is aimed to improve the economic infrastructure of Uttoxeter and the surrounding Staffordshire environment. Indeed, it is widely hoped that this will result in the creation of over 1,000 employment opportunities that will breathe life into the local economy as a result of the building and construction works that are currently under way. One cannot dig up 11,000 meters cube without causing a little groundwater to flow, and that is what Sykes Pumps have been hired to deal with, and they have so far managed to get rid of the groundwater that could have proved detrimental to the project’s success. In fact, they also succeeded furthermore in their implementation of the pumping system, which ensured that they were able to pump the excess water successfully without causing too much noise pollution. Through this, the £27 million enterprise is still successfully under way, is not causing too much of a heartbreak for the quiet Staffordshire community, and furthermore is set to be finished by the winter months of next year.

Future Energy Solutions has intimated that there is currently a great deal of unnecessary confusion and uncertainty about the various things that can be done to use renewable resources of energy in the households of British people. It is evident that what the Tory government has been doing is simply not enough in trying to encourage people to use more varied forms of renewable energy in their daily activities. If anything, their support for the nuclear power station in Sellafield at the upcoming local election is evidence enough that they are not putting renewable sources of energy at the top of their priorities and are instead trying to gain as much popularity as they can at a time when Labor’s opinion polls are unexpectedly low. The MD of Future Energy Solutions Joel Tetlow has emphasized that there simply is not enough awareness with what can actually be done in order to help us secure ourselves a sustainable and environmentally stable future. This will undoubtedly have some kind of impact on all of us at some point or another and it is therefore vital that these legitimate concerns are listened to and acted upon. The fact that the country as a whole is actually on track to missing its target for renewable energy sources by quite a large margin suggests that we have actually been going backwards and that not enough is being done to find out the alternative renewable resources that we can use to supply energy all over the National Grid. It is also evident that whilst Future Energy is doing what it can to inform the public of what simple things can be done to reduce our impact on the environment, this is just not enough and some special form of government backing and legislation needs to be implemented in order to make a change. Reusing bags to avoid the 5p charge is simply not enough of an advancement.