Context
Major incidents in industries regulated under major hazards legislation continue to occur. These incidents provide a wealth of learning opportunities that are beneficial to any industry concerned with the challenges of managing low frequency/high consequence events. Since the Process Safety Forum has been established, the sharing of lessons across industries has been judged by the Forum membership to be beneficial: the membership has expanded to 14 member associations.
Aims of Forum
The Process Safety Forum was set-up to provide a platform whereby initiatives, best practice, lessons from incidents and process safety strategy can be distilled and shared across sectors; to influence our stakeholders (including the Regulator); and to drive the process safety management performance agenda. The Forum may, from time to time, make recommendations to industry via the member associations on directions of travel that would likely benefit all sectors.
Outcomes
- A shared understanding of the current initiatives in place and immediate future plans in all sectors on process safety;
- Identification of barriers to sharing of best practice and incident learning in sectors, and facilitating the development of recommendations for improvement;
- Identification of initiatives to enhance process safety leadership across sectors;
- A shared understanding of effective process safety performance indicators;
- Stakeholders (including the Regulator) are informed and engaged. Messages are collective where appropriate and individual where necessary.
Governance, Roles and Responsibilities
- The PSF will report progress to the trade associations on a quarterly basis;
- PSF will be chaired by Paul Thomas;
- Each member association in turn will host the meetings;
- Secretariat support will be provided by a member association representative;
- The chair is responsible for leadership of the PSF and ensuring that it delivers its objectives successfully, resolving any disagreements between PSF members.
Members of the Task Group include representatives from:
- Energy Networks Association;
- Chemical Business Association;
- UK Petroleum Industry Association;
- Chemical Industry Association;
- Tank Storage Association;
- Engineering Construction Industry Association;
- UK Liquefied Petroleum Gas;
- UK Nuclear Industry Safety Directors’ Forum;
- Oil and Gas UK;
- Rail Safety and Standards Board;
- Explosives Industry Group;
- Scotch Whisky Association;
- Mineral Products Association;
- British Aerosol Manufacturers Association;
- UK Onshore Pipeline Operators’ Association.
Members will:
- Contribute data and information wherever possible to support the aims of the Forum;
- Communicate openly within the Forum and respect information provided by others in confidence;
- Observe constraints imposed on the exchange of commercially sensitive information by Competition Law;
- Provide feedback to their member association.