How Marshalls Built a Safety Culture That Wins Industry Awards

UK building materials manufacturer Marshalls secured recognition in two categories at the 2026 Mineral Products Association (MPA) Health & Safety Awards, held in July 2026. Owen Bevan, an Engineering Technician at the company's Pollington site, won the overall Young Leaders Award, while Marshalls received a Highly Commended designation in the Safer Maintenance and Housekeeping category for a competency training framework built around National Occupational Standards (NOS). The awards highlight how a multi-site industrial operation can systematically address health and safety through structured training, skills-gap identification, and recognition of emerging leadership talent.

What Did Marshalls Win at the 2026 MPA Health & Safety Awards?

The natural stone and concrete products manufacturer achieved recognition in two distinct categories. Six Marshalls colleagues were shortlisted in the Young Leaders Award category, which celebrates individuals making a tangible difference to health and safety performance. Owen Bevan, Engineering Technician at the Pollington site, was named the overall winner. Five colleagues received recognition alongside him:

Rhys Scott, Ewan Binnie, and Declan Fielding attended the awards ceremony in person to collect their recognition. The second accolade—Highly Commended in the Safer Maintenance and Housekeeping category—reflected the company's entry being recognised as one of the top five from 28 submissions. That entry showcased a new competency training framework designed to identify skills gaps in high-risk activities, including hot works and welding, and to provide structured, site-led training across operations.

Why National Occupational Standards Matter for High-Risk Maintenance

Marshalls' Highly Commended entry centred on a training framework built around National Occupational Standards. NOS are competency benchmarks developed by industry bodies and recognised across the UK to ensure consistent skill levels in specific trades and activities. By anchoring its training to these standards, Marshalls aims to identify where skills gaps exist in high-risk activities—particularly hot works and welding—and to deliver structured, site-led training that builds capability, confidence, and consistency.

The framework is designed to be scalable across Marshalls' multiple manufacturing sites, which include operations producing concrete blocks, paving, and natural stone products. For multi-site manufacturers in the building materials sector, maintaining consistent safety standards while accommodating local site conditions remains a persistent challenge. The NOS-based approach offers a standardised baseline, while site-led delivery allows adaptation to local equipment, processes, and risk profiles.

Training Framework Targets Hot Works and Welding

Hot works and welding are among the highest-risk activities in manufacturing environments, particularly in facilities handling aggregates, cement-based products, and metal components. Welding operations introduce fire risk, fume exposure, and equipment hazards. The Marshalls framework uses National Occupational Standards to define competency requirements for each role, then maps existing workforce skills against those benchmarks to identify gaps. Once gaps are identified, the company provides structured training—delivered on-site rather than externally—to ensure employees acquire the skills and knowledge needed to carry out critical work safely.

Annabelle Brayford, Head of Safety, Health and Environment at Marshalls, commented on the recognition:

Young Leaders Award: Recognising Emerging Safety Advocates

The Young Leaders Award category recognises individuals who are making a demonstrable difference to health and safety, often early in their careers. Owen Bevan's win as overall Young Leaders Award recipient underscores the importance of embedding safety leadership across all levels of an organisation, not solely within dedicated SHEQ functions. Engineering technicians, operations team managers, and trade-qualified staff play a direct role in day-to-day risk management, equipment maintenance, and incident prevention.

For building materials manufacturers facing skills shortages and an ageing workforce, developing internal safety leadership among younger employees can strengthen both recruitment and retention. Industry bodies including the Mineral Products Association have long emphasised the need for proactive safety culture to counter the sector's higher-than-average accident rates, particularly in quarrying, cement production, and heavy manufacturing.

What This Means for Safety Culture in Building Materials Manufacturing

The recognition at the 2026 MPA Health & Safety Awards reflects a broader industry shift towards competency-based safety management. Traditional compliance approaches—focused on periodic inspections, signage, and generic training—are increasingly supplemented by role-specific competency frameworks that link training directly to task-level risks. This approach is particularly relevant for manufacturers operating multiple sites, where consistency in safety standards must be maintained despite variations in equipment, product lines, and workforce composition.

For Marshalls, the NOS-based framework offers several operational benefits beyond safety compliance. By identifying skills gaps systematically, the company can prioritise training investment where it delivers the greatest risk reduction. Site-led delivery ensures training is contextually relevant and immediately applicable, reducing the lag between classroom instruction and on-the-job application. And by building capability internally, the company reduces reliance on external contractors for high-risk maintenance tasks, improving both cost control and oversight.

Implications for Regulatory Compliance and Insurance

While the MPA awards are industry-led rather than regulatory, competency-based training frameworks align with evolving expectations from the UK Health and Safety Executive (HSE) and insurers. The HSE has increasingly emphasised the importance of demonstrable competence in its enforcement activity, particularly following incidents involving inadequately trained personnel. Insurers, meanwhile, use safety performance data—including training records, incident rates, and audit outcomes—to price premiums and assess risk.

For building materials manufacturers, structured training frameworks tied to recognised standards such as NOS provide auditable evidence of competency, which can support both HSE inspections and insurance renewals. In sectors where margins are tight and operational continuity is critical, avoiding incidents through proactive training is both a safety imperative and a financial priority.

Next Steps: Scaling the Framework Across Sites

Marshalls has not disclosed a timeline for full rollout of the NOS-based training framework across all sites, nor has it published data on the number of employees trained to date or the reduction in incident rates associated with the programme. However, the Highly Commended recognition suggests the framework has progressed beyond pilot stage and is delivering measurable results in at least some facilities.

For other manufacturers in the building materials sector—including producers of concrete, brick, and aggregates—the Marshalls approach offers a replicable model. Key elements include anchoring training to recognised standards, identifying skills gaps through systematic assessment, delivering training on-site for contextual relevance, and recognising individuals who champion safety improvements. The challenge for multi-site operators will be maintaining consistency while accommodating site-specific risk profiles and operational constraints.

The 2026 MPA Health & Safety Awards also highlight the growing importance of leadership development in safety performance. As the building materials sector faces demographic pressures—including an ageing workforce and skills shortages—investing in young leaders who can embed safety culture from the ground up may prove as critical as capital investment in equipment or automation.