Winner and finalists:

Liverpool Housing Trust wins this award for the all-encompassing nature of its programme, which assesses more than 70 contractors and involves the entire supply chain

Liverpool Housing Trust

Working with more than 70 contractors, Liverpool Housing Trust (LHT) realised that it was important to make sure everyone was toeing the health and safety line. Approved contractors are formally assessed every year for competence, performance and controls, and are not invited to tender until they can prove they meet the highest standards of health and safety, including mandatory CSCS membership. After the contract is finished, the entire supply chain including the customer is invited to a review meeting at which the projects successes and failings are discussed. Every year, client and contractors join forces at LHTs annual contractor conference, which this year saw the launch of a training DVD and a specialised code of practice that informs contractors of the latest LHT health and safety criteria. As a result, LHT has met 95% of its key performance indicators.

Frank Haslam Milan

Everybody needs good neighbours, especially when youre engaged in a building project next door to a school. Social housing contractor Frank Haslam Milans development in Darlington was adjacent to St Johns Primary School, so the company took to the classroom. Not only did they brief pupils about the dangers of playing on site, but they sponsored an anti-bullying campaign, took them to plant trees to help offset carbon emissions and even transformed an area of derelict land into a nature garden for the pupils.

McInerney Homes

In Ireland, an average of at least one child dies each year on construction sites. In association with the countrys Construction Industry Federation, McInerney Homes has helped pilot the Play Safe Stay Safe scheme. Targeted at primary school children between the ages of seven and nine, the industry initiative sees McInerney employees give classroom talks and hand out free eight-page safety comics featuring cartoons, quizzes and competitions. Since its 2005 launch, the scheme has been rolled out to an average of 15 schools per year.

Warings Construction

Making sure local children are safe can go beyond stifling classroom chats. Warings realised that children who may not be old enough to be able to read and write properly are still at danger from buildings sites. For its Can You Hear Voices campaign, Warings ran very young children through video-based hazard spotting exercises, made them to perform a simplified risk assessment and asked each of them to design their own safe behaviour character. Teachers and pupils agreed that keeping safe could also be fun.