Anglian Water Irish contractor arm claims health scheme cuts absentee rates

Republic of Ireland- based design, construction, and operations contractor in the water sector and a subsidiary of Anglian Water has claimed to have reduced absent rates by more than one third over the two years since introducing a health promotion programme.

The company, Celtic Anglian Water (CAW), operates one of the Europe’s largest wastewater treatment plants at Ringsend in Dublin, treating over 50% of Ireland’s wastewater.

Its programme, dubbed Life, focuses on "improving culture around health, safety and wellbeing. Absentee levels have, the company claimed, fallen from 6.9 days a employee per year two years ago to 4.5 days since the introduction of the Life initiative. It has also boosted motivation, increased staff retention and assisted in making the company more attractive to potential recruits.

Initiatives launched by the company included:

• the implementation of mental health workshops. with a staff participation currently at increased to 70%;

• a four-week, online Mindfulness-based cognitive behavioural therapy course and stress management workshops;

• a bowel screening programme with 100% participation;

• provision of fruit baskets to the employees with advice on benefits and a family cookbook developed with recipes from staff across the business;

• a testicular cancer awareness campaign;

• a smoking cessation campaign; and

• pre-diabetic screening with 100% employee participation.