Panton McLeod Makes £10k First Aid Investment For Staff

Panton McLeod Blog

Holyrood PR PR in Scotland provides public relations for Panton McLeod Pioneering water quality engineering firm Panton McLeod has re-established its health and safety credentials by making its entire operational staff achieve official first aid qualifications.

The Borders-based firm, which is the UK’s leading expert in inspecting and cleaning underground water storage tanks, sent all 14 of its operational staff on the HSE-accredited course to ensure that they are all able to provide first aid services on-site.

The firm originally planned to just have one member of staff trained in first aid at each cleaning and repair job that it does throughout the UK – in order to provide an even better and safer service for its clients.

But directors at the firm decided to invest £10,000 to give all of their staff the qualification so that there would always be fully-trained first aiders at every job, even during instances of illness or unforeseen staff shortages.

Gary Flockhart, Panton McLeod’s Safety, Health, Environmental and Quality (SHEQ) Manager, said: “Having a full complement of staff with extensive first aid training is yet another way we are trying to provide an even better service for our clients.

“We originally planned to ensure that at least one member of staff with first aid training would be present at every job we carry out in the UK. But, at the same time, we didn’t want to get into the situation where we were worrying about where our first aiders were and trying to get them to cover a number of different sites every week.

“Eventually we realized that the easiest way of ensuring that we would always have first aiders available and ready to go onsite in every eventuality was to train up our entire complement of on-site staff. It’s been a big investment but we believe it will be worthwhile in terms of providing the best service for our clients.

“We must be one of the only companies in the UK water industry to provide this level of first aid cover, so we’re delighted with everyone’s achievement in passing the course.”

A total of 14 members of staff from Panton McLeod completed the four-day course in Stoke, including the finance and personnel director Shelagh Briggs – whose qualification means that the company’s headquarters in the Scottish Borders is now also always covered by a first aid specialist.

The first aid training is the latest in a long list of health and safety standards that are in place across Panton McLeod’s operations. The firm currently provides expert closed space training and risk assessment on every job it undertakes, as well as maintaining its ISO 9001:2000 quality standard – the industry mark of excellence which reassures clients, including utility giants like Scottish Water and the main privatised English water companies, that Panton McLeod operates at the highest levels.

Because of the sensitive nature of working within the drinking water industry, the firm also meticulously tests and disinfects all of its equipment to ensure that there is no danger of contamination to water supplies.

Panton McLeod, which has offices in the Scottish Borders, Nottingham and the United States, is one of the best-known names in the water industry, working with the biggest companies on the inspection, cleaning and repair of drinking water structures.

It has also pioneered the use of innovative robots which are deployed to inspect and clean underground water storage tanks without disrupting supplies to customers.

Panton McLeod is supported by public relations experts the Holyrood PR, who promote the company’s PR in Scotland.