Smiths believes it is right to adopt a consistent approach to EHS issues across all our activities. Our EHS programmes cover all our operations worldwide not just those in North America and the UK.

We follow a risk-based approach in managing the EHS aspects of our operations and are implementing an environmental management system to ISO 14001 at each of our major manufacturing sites. This particularly suits the decentralised nature of our operations, allowing individual businesses to integrate environmental thinking into their operations, focus on their own significant aspects and improve their eco-efficiency, legal compliance, risk management and product design processes.

ISO 14001 Certification

In November 2000, we set ourselves a demanding three-year goal to achieve ISO 14001 certification for all our major manufacturing sites by the end of December 2003. We have made excellent progress and, at the end of July 2003, 96 per cent of the targeted businesses - 77 of 80 facilities in 17 countries - had achieved certification to this international standard. Timescales for new acquisitions to seek ISO 14001 certification will be set by the Group EHS Committee.

Our ISO 14001 certification programme is truly global.

Notes: Major manufacturing sites are those which employ 50 or more people; or fewer than 50 people but with potentially high environmental impacts in the context of Smiths operations (eg. regulated for air emissions, significant user of hazerdous materials or large quantity waste generator).
Other sites include repair facilities or small manufacturing sites.
John Crane in Shannon is also registered to EMAS, the European Eco-Management and Audit Scheme.

Responsibility for internal environmental auditing is devolved to businesses at site level under ISO 14001. More than 500 internal environmental audits were conducted during 2003, together with over 160 external assessments/audits by our ISO 14001 certifiers.

Safety Manual and Audit System

Guidance for health and safety management within the Group is set out in a global ‘best practice’ safety manual modelled on the standard for Occupational Health and Safety Management Systems (OHSAS 18001). Guidance focuses on the management and control of 60 common hazards and issues in our operations including the risk assessment process, hazardous substance management, lone working, travelling on company business and the function of safety committees.

We are continuing the roll out of our safety audit process across all our major operations. The AuditMaster™ tool contains more than 300 questions on the management of health and safety, risk assessments, control and protection arrangements, and health and welfare. By the end of July 2003, 72 of 107 major facilities in 10 countries had completed at least one AuditMaster™ health and safety audit.

Like our ISO 14001 effort, the implementation of AuditMasterTM is global.

Notes: Major sites include manufacturing facilities and larger service centre/repair facilities. Other sites refers to smaller service centre operations.

OHSAS 18001 Certification

John Crane GmbH, Smiths Medical in Germany and John Crane Safematic in Finland have been successfully certified against the requirements of OHSAS 18001. Smiths’ businesses pursue certification to this standard in line with their needs. John Crane UK and John Crane South Africa are currently pursuing OHSAS 18001 certification.