Time to demonstrate our value, says new president elect
November 11th 2009 The next president of the Institution of Occupational Safety and Health (IOSH) says that its time for the profession to demonstrate the value of professional health and safety advice.
Steve Granger (50), from Midhurst, West Sussex, has been elected as the new President Elect of the Institution of Occupational Safety and Health (IOSH), which has over 35,000 members in 85 countries worldwide.
Steve, who is the director of his own health and safety consultancy, The Granger Partnership, is a Chartered Member of IOSH. He said of his election: “It’s obviously a massive honour to have been elected as President Elect of a body like IOSH, and I hope that I’ll be able to play my part in helping to keep people free from harm in workplaces, not just in the UK, but worldwide.
“Health and safety is about keeping workplaces free from harm and ill-health. Around 200 people are killed, 136,000 suffer terrible injuries and over 2 million have debilitating illnesses from unnecessary accidents and incidents in the workplace. That’s why health and safety is something that needs to be taken seriously, not ridiculed.”
Steve added: “Health and safety is something many organisations get wrong because they fail to get the expert advice they need. They assume its all “common sense”, or something they don’t really have to bother about. It’s only when something goes wrong, that they realise how important health and safety actually is. It prevents lives being destroyed.”
During his three-year stint on the IOSH presidential team, Steve said his intentions were to “help demonstrate the value of health and safety professionals and the advice they give”. “I want to show that the newspaper headlines about health and safety professionals being killjoys are not true,” Steve said, adding: “Professional health and safety advice is critical to a well-run, profitable business which people actually want to work for.”
Steve began his career by joining the Royal Navy aged 18, and it was this that gave him an insight into the management and maintenance of industrial plant, machinery and electrical systems, refrigeration, pressurised systems, hazardous fluid handling, emergency procedures and fire prevention, all of which have been critical to the development of his career.
In 1991, Steve joined Water Training International (WTI) as a safety training officer, before joining Highbury College in Portsmouth in 1993 as a lecturer in occupational safety and health. His career then took him to Chichester District Council in 2000 as facilities, safety and health and business continuity manager, where he managed a team of 24 staff.
Steve was the founding chairman of the IOSH South Downs Branch, is a curriculum manager for health and safety training at the Chartered Institute of Environmental Health (CIEH) and is a moderator and examinations marker for the National Examinations Board for Occupational Safety and Health (NEBOSH).
Away from the workplace, Steve is married to Carol and has an active interest in wildlife and is a member of a Badger Protection Group, regularly undertaking wildlife and conservation work. With his wife, he owns and runs an organic shop. He also enjoys skiing, windsurfing and motorcycling.
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