Education and Innovation at the Heart of Safety & Health Expo

Europe’s largest annual event for health and safety industry professionals proved once again to be a ‘must-attend’ event. Safety & Health Expo 2011, organised by UBM Live and hosted at Birmingham NEC from 17-19th May, combined varied and comprehensive educational content with innovative industry leading exhibitors to provide over 17,000 visitors with a thoroughly worthwhile and engaging event.

Safety & Health Expo was hosted in partnership with the British Safety Industry Federation (BSIF), the Institution of Occupational Safety & Health (IOSH) and the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents (RoSPA).

David Lummis, Chief Executive Officer of BSIF comments: “Once again Safety & Health Expo 2011 created an excellent forum for all sectors of the health and safety industry to meet, talk, learn and carry out business. The BSIF stand benefited from a large number of international visitors, together with numerous senior health and safety professionals, providing great networking and learning opportunities. Once again the announcement of the BSIF Safety Awards winners highlighted one of the event’s key strengths - a venue to learn about innovation in products and services - a theme that was carried throughout the three days.”

Tom Mullarkey, RoSPA’s chief executive has also shown his ongoing enthusiasm for Safety & Health Expo, saying: “RoSPA was once again proud to be a part of this year’s Safety and Health Expo success story. The RoSPA stand was a real triumph, with the cyclone game attracting a huge number of willing participants all keen to enter our competition.

“Safety & Health Expo is always a great opportunity to meet our colleagues and fellow professionals, and hear about the good work they’re doing on the ground. This year was no exception; we were able to meet and talk to a great many people – old friends and new. Our stand saw an excellent level of footfall, and we established plenty of new relationships with event-goers.

“The calibre of stands and exhibits was extremely high, and everyone involved can be very proud of their contributions to an excellent event.”

Visitors were able to explore a range of the latest and most exciting products on the market with stands from industry leading organisations including Draeger, Posturite, Scott Safety, Denios, Barbour and Honeywell. Stand highlights included Arco’s life size replica of the BLOODHOUND; the supersonic vehicle which will soon challenge the land speed record and BM Polyco’s double decker bus.

“The feedback received from our show partners, exhibitors and visitors this year has been exemplary,” said Adrian Newton, Portfolio Director for Safety & Building Management, UBM Live. “We work hard each year to ensure that Safety & Health Expo is a must-attend event for professionals across the health and safety industry.”

“This year the educational content proved to be a particular highlight with the SHP Legal Arena packed for every session. The popularity of these seminars highlights the importance of ongoing learning opportunities for health and safety professionals in an ever changing legislative and regulatory landscape. The Occupational Health Theatre, sponsored by Posturite and Colebrook Bosson Saunders, was also a huge success in this, its inaugural year. I’m delighted that so many delegates were able to benefit from these valuable sessions.”

The Access Industry Forum (AIF) Knowledge Base returned to the show for its second year and once again provided delegates with the opportunity to learn about the range of issues associated with working at height. One session which attracted a full capacity audience was the ‘Holy Grail’ panel debate featuring six of the UK’s leading health and safety organisations coming together to debate how to eradicate falls from height in the workplace. Chaired by David Thomas, Safety, Health and Environment Director at William Hare Ltd, the panel consisted of Peter Bennett, Chairman of the AIF; Joy Jones from the Health and Safety Executive (HSE); Nigel Bryson OBE from the British Safety Council (BSC); Barry Holt from the International Institute of Risk and Safety Management (IIRSM); John Holden from IOSH, and Roger Bibbings MBE from RoSPA. Overall the AIF knowledge base saw a rise in attendance of over 38% compared to 2010.

Safety & Health Expo 2011 also saw the announcement of the launch of two further international safety events by UBM Live, a division of UBM plc. OSH Expo Africa will take place from 6-8 of September 2011 co-located with IFSEC South Africa and the recently launched The Facilities Show Africa. OSH Expo Arabia is planned for 20-22 November. The 2012 Safety & Health Expo will return to Birmingham from 15-17 May 2012.