Occupational health and safety

Iren, all top-tier Companies and the main investee companies have adopted BS OHSAS 18001 or ISO 45001 certified systems to ensure systematic monitoring of occupational health and safety aspects, covering 100% of the workforce employed in certified companies (approximately 98% of the Group’s total workforce).

Safety management

The Group’s safety management system is supervised by a single Safety Service within the Parent Company, which guarantees the standardisation of risk assessment methods, the identification of organisational, procedural and technical measures, and the training needs of personnel in the field. Specific codified and systematic audit procedures allow for the monitoring and the continuous improvement of this system to be pursued.

Specific objectives are identified as part of the progressive computerisation of the Safety Management System (through the “G.AM.MA.” app which guarantees uniformity of approach and the relative monitoring activities), when standardising the management of cross-departmental topics (including the issue of Group procedures regarding PPE, health checks, emergencies, accidents) and during the progressive integration of newly acquired Companies incorporated into Iren Group.

Each Group Company organises at least one annual meeting on corporate security (Article 35 of Italian Legislative Decree 81/2008), and, as a rule, one or two other meetings per year for discussion and updating attended by the Workers’ Health and Safety Representatives (HSR). Surveys and specific meetings are also carried out at the request of the HSRs and/or workers. The HSRs are also invited to take part in the visits to the workplace with the occupational health physician (Article 25 of Italian Legislative Decree 81/2008) and are involved in audits of certified systems.

The reporting and management of accidents and near-misses takes place through hierarchical channels and subject to supervision by the prevention and protection service according to specific procedures regulating the process, which may be computerised and are accessible to all workers. A detailed analysis of the event is carried out, aimed at identifying the causes of unwanted events, and the necessary actions and skills to prevent them. A specific app (Safety App) on the company smartphones provided to all employees enables near-misses to be reported, promoting employee participation and facilitating the introduction of any corrective actions.

The safety system documentation (procedures, emergency plans, operating instructions, guidelines for safe working, etc.) establishes the cases and situations where workers are required to distance themselves from potentially hazardous or unexpected situations, and/or to avoid certain activities requiring specific training for which they are not qualified. With regard to the specific characteristics and needs of Group Companies, specific procedures are adopted to regulate particular situation and risks (works in confined spaces or in case of suspected pollution, external works in the case of weather alerts or employees operating alone, etc.).

The risk identification and assessment process is regulated by specific procedures and by software that guarantees a standardised approach. For each working activity, the risks and the appropriate prevention and protection measures, personal protective equipment (PPE) necessary to conduct said activities, proper conduct and any organisational measures or other requirements are identified and evaluated. Furthermore, workplaces are analysed to identify and evaluate the risks present, taking instrumental measurements where necessary. The assignment to each worker, directly or through groups (safety certifications) of the results of the assessments conducted on working activities and workplaces completes the risk profile of each individual worker, identifying the consequent general protection measures to be implemented such as the provision of necessary PPE, the need or otherwise for health checks, and the results of these, where applicable. This structured evaluation process is conducted and coordinated by the Prevention and Protection Service (PPS) of each Company, with the indispensable involvement of the operating units. The PPS also carries out periodic controls to check the correct implementation of the provisions.

For Group Companies with OHSAS 18001 or ISO 45001 certification, specific and periodic audits are also planned by certified external independent auditors with the aim of verifying the correct implementation of the occupational health and safety management system. The results of these audits are brought to the addition of the Management to enable the relative action to be taken.

There is a specific section dedicated to occupational health and safety in the Group’s Industrial Relations Protocol and specific agreements have been signed that regulate special content (for example, business trips).

The focus on accidents is also demonstrated by the provision of specific objectives, provided within the MbO system, of containment or prevention, assigned to the managers of operational structures most exposed to these risks.

Health checks

Employee health checks are carried out on the basis of their assigned duties (around 6,500 medical examinations in 2020); these are organised centrally by the safety service while diagnostic checks are planned and conducted by a specialist external company.

Pursuant to current law, the medical examinations are carried out by external occupational health physicians, appointed by the employers of each Group company. A specific Group procedure, issued at the beginning of 2020, defines the shared approach, including the standardisation of health protocols. The correct planning and monitoring of health checks for all workers is guaranteed by the G.AM.MA. app, where data is uploaded which includes workers’ risk profiles according to the possible professional exposure level specified in the risk assessment documents, the obligatory nature of the health checks, the date of any assessments, the fit-to-work certificate and any provisions/limitations. To respect personal privacy, information contained on the G.AM.MA. app is made available to employees, executives, senior executives, medical professionals and the PPS only when relevant.

The G.AM.MA. app is certified (following DT 63 Certisoftware, requirements for attesting the conformity of software for the implementation and maintenance of standards of business management systems) to manage the requirements of the BS OHSAS 18001 and UNI 45001 standards.

Healthcare initiatives and programmes and those relating to the general prevention plan are defined at contractual level and through the corporate welfare system.

With regards to occupational ill-health, the risk assessment document (RAD) is constantly updated and requires a very low level of professional risk in order to vastly reduce the likelihood of illness. This probability is minimal both upstream and downstream of the control chain implemented by the Group. Upstream, the results of the risk assessment documents of Group Companies are drawn up in collaboration with the RSPP and the occupational health physicians and meetings are called to discuss the outcome of the various surveys of working environments, during which, where necessary, any critical situations may be reported by the competent parties within their area of expertise, providing indications or suggestions aimed at improving working conditions. Downstream, the occupational health physicians identify the residual risks and draw up a health check protocol shared at Group level, which aims to protect the mental and physical health of workers and to identify any potentially or effectively hypersensitive persons, correlating the working risk with specific diagnostic checks and enable the correct identification of any personal limitations or provisions. The occupational health physician is however required by law to report any suspected occupational ill-health to the competent bodies.

In 2020, three cases of occupational illness were recognized as such by INAIL.

No specific initiatives or programmes limited to serious illness are planned, however, numerous initiatives and programmes concerning welfare and general prevention are planned, both at the level of the collective labour agreements and through specific company agreements.

The actions extend to all Group Companies supervised by the Safety Service department; any company not falling into this category, such as newly acquired companies, will be gradually integrated into the safety management system, always and in any case in compliance with the law.

Main indicators of health and safety

⁽¹⁾ Accidents during travel and those not recognised by INAIL are excluded.

⁽²⁾ Injuries lasting longer than 6 months.

⁽³⁾ The severity index and average duration of absence for accidents do not reflect, in terms of days of absence, fatal accidents occurring to two employees.

⁽¹⁾ Near miss secondo la norma ISO 45001:2018.

The accident trend in 2020 shows a reversal from the previous year. In fact, there was a significant reduction in the accident indexes, both the frequency index, at 24.93 (30.53 in 2019), and the severity index, at 0.82 (0.98 in 2019). Conversely, the average duration of absence for accidents, 33.03 days, remains almost constant (32.05 days in 2019). Two fatal accidents occurred in 2020.

The “Iren people: the numbers” section shows the breakdown of the accident indexes for the last three years.

Accidents by geographical area (no.)

Immagine

Accidents by type (no.)

Immagine

Health and safety training

The main objectives of the Group’s training activities include the improvement of conduct and the consolidation of a culture characterised by health and safety at all operational levels. Among the training initiatives aimed at employees, in fact, those in occupational health and safety continue to play a prominent role, which, in 2020, recorded almost 36,000 hours of training provided, with an average per capita of 4.3 hours.

In relation to the health emergency, which excluded training in attendance for most of the year with a resumption only in the second half of the year with constraints on the number of classes, priority was given to refresher courses whose deadlines were not suspended, those for which it was possible to provide them in a virtual classroom or asynchronously, as well as those aimed at new entries and/or the inclusion of personnel in tasks and/or new risks present in the risk assessment document. The main initiatives were:

• basic training and updates for executives, managers and workers, for emergency and first aid officers, on specific risks (confined environments, electrical environment, asbestos, isolated work, biological risk from legionella), on the use of personal protective equipment (work at height, respiratory system, hearing, confined environments, electrical and chemical-biological risk, etc.);
• qualification and refresher courses for safety officers (RSPP/ASPP, HSR, site safety coordinators, fire prevention officers, HSE trainers, executives and staff responsible for asbestos removal, disposal and remediation);
• training and refresher courses on the use of equipment (forklifts, earth-moving machinery, lifting platforms, cranes, tractors, etc.);
• equipment training (cranes, mobile generators, portable ladders, trolleys for the transport of goods and people and/or lifts/cable cars, waste collection machinery and compactors, environmental health equipment, manholes);
• specific internal procedures (production of advanced works plans covering electricity risk, management of work permits, emergency management, etc.).

The Training Portal is integrated with the “G.AM.MA.” app for security management, in order to allow for training needs to be constantly updated in relation to the risks to employees and the security responsibilities assigned to them, as well as to monitor the expiry dates of the relative updates. In the second half of 2020, the logical interface relationships between the Training Portal and the G.AM.MA. app were reviewed to systematise the collection of training needs in safety and the projections of updating needs in the different years. This method will make it possible to plan initiatives more accurately and over a longer period.

The effectiveness of the safety training is assessed through tests or, as provided for by law, practical assessments.

N.B. The personnel data contained in the Sustainability Report do not contain the data of the former Unieco Environment Division.