Workplace Safety

With over 100 facilities in 4 countries, 4670 staff globally and annual engagement of over 9000 independent contracting personnel (responsible for construction, security, cleaning, maintenance and other facility related services), risk management - particularly in relation to the health and safety of employees, contractors and visitors - is an essential element of Westfield’s management processes and demonstrates Westfield’s duty of care.  

Westfield began publicly reporting its safety data in 2010. Safety performance and culture continues to be embedded and enhanced across the Group. A key aspect of this is Westfield’ Global Safety Reporting (GSR) system, which is aligned to the Group’s unique business model, enabling key life safety indicators to be monitored across each of the markets so that safety performance can be assessed and improved.

The GSR continues to be refined to allow the Group to automate the consolidation of data from site, region, and country. A key feature is the inclusion of third party data. Independent contractors account for approximately 85% of Westfield’s total hours worked so in order to “manage what you measure” it has been a critical step to enable principal contractors (cleaning and security) to access the system to submit their data to be included and rolled up into the overall reporting workflow. This has been implemented across the centres in Australia with a view to rolling out globally. 

Westfield uses two main indicators to measure safety performance of its employees and independent contractors; Lost Time Injury Frequency Rates (LTIFR) and Average Lost Day Rate (ALDR). These indicators capture not only the frequency of lost time but also the severity of lost time injuries.

For the purposes of this report Westfield has reported on injuries which are defined as ‘significant’ -injuries which arise out of or in the course of work that result in:

• fracture (other than to fingers, toes or nose)
• any amputation 
• permanent loss of sight or hearing (excluding chronic hearing loss)
• unconsciousness (excluding fainting)
• any full thickness burns 
• permanent loss of use of any internal organ (excluding hernias)

The statistics do not include minor (first aid style) injuries and exclude members of the public.

Total Group Safety Data

In 2011 Westfield achieved a meaningful reduction in LTIFR, from 8.35 in 2010 to 5.92, and a slight reduction in the absentee rate of Westfield employees to 1.2% across the Group. This can be attributed to improving the overall safety culture at Westfield by embedding risk and safety key performance indicators into executive and individual employee plans; requiring all independent contractors to undertake Westfield induction programs and improving the systems and processes for collecting, measuring and reporting safety performance across the Group. 

Westfield believes that low injury and absentee rates can be linked to positive trends in staff morale and productivity. As such, the Group is committed to reducing the frequency and severity injuries amongst all employees and contractors by maintaining focus on injury prevention, early intervention and return-to-work programs.