News

As part of our ongoing continuous improvement programme, a new role has been created at Chem Resist; Health and Safety Manager.

Simon Hewitt, Managing Director explains, “Over the last 18 months we’ve experienced a period of very strong growth across all our divisions, we’ve also achieved ISO 45001 to sit alongside our existing 9001 (Quality) and 14001 (the Environment) accreditations. We take our responsibilities to health and safety, quality and the environment very seriously, which is reflected in the creation of this new dedicated role and we welcome Mike to Chem Resist.”

Mike Shoemark (pictured here with Odelle Hewitt) has an extensive career in Health & Safety, holding various roles for organisations involved in manufacturing within the chemical and allied industries.

Originally from Salisbury, Mike studied chemistry and bio-chemistry and trained as a medical micro-biologist. His career in Health and Safety began at a cadmium pigment manufacturing plant in Bletchley. He then then moved north to Huddersfield to work for James Robinson for over 10 years and then for PPG, providing technical advice directly to consumers of their paint range.

Mike comments, “At PPG, they already had a Health and Safety Manager, so I transferred my skills into a Regulatory Advice role and became customer facing. I then decided I wanted to move back into an operational role and moved to the Midlands to work for PolymerLatex.  This was a top tier COMAH site where over a 5-year period I was responsible for its decommissioning, decontamination and divestment. This was actually a really good experience; I met a lot of interesting people on the project and it was also an interesting procedure from an environmental point of view.

“My job title here is Health and Safety Manager, but my role covers the environment, quality and occupational health. Chem Resist has a really good IT infrastructure, a solid ISO system and the relevant certifications so I’ll be focussing on making sure we make the best use of all the existing resources and systems we have.

“One of my major efforts so far has been improving how we handle non-conformances under any of the standards. I’ve been around a lot of manufacturing so can quickly see the things we’re doing right and the things we need to change or change very soon. I’ll also be focussing on making sure we make best use of the available space we have at Dewsbury. I was pleased when I joined to see how many young qualified fabricators we have, there’s a demographic employment challenge being faced by many manufacturing businesses, which we need to make sure we stay ahead of.”

Odelle Hewitt, Commercial Director adds, “We’re experiencing a very exciting period of growth; previously the responsibility for Health and Safety was shared across various roles in the business. By creating a dedicated role we’re able to give these fundamental principles real focus and priority in both our day-to-day activities and future plans.”