Who are Rio Tinto?

Rio Tinto in Australia directly employees more than 20,000 people, and many more contractors. Australia is home to around half of Rio Tinto’s global assets, and we produce iron ore, coal, bauxite, alumina, aluminium, uranium, copper, gold, diamonds and salt from more than 30 operating sites and processing plants around the country.

Regardless of where our people are located and the role they undertake, light vehicles travelling on public roads is identified as the highest safety risk faced by employees and contractors. This risk applies to both in working time, and in their private time.

What does road safety mean to RioTinto?

Rio Tinto’s  Iron Ore business in Western Australia has developed a light vehicle safety strategy aimed at mitigating this risk, and key components include:

  • Our approach to vehicle selection (either hired or owned) is biased towards vehicles with the highest possible safety rating.
  • We are working with manufacturers of vehicles used in our operations to ensure that the applications in which we use these vehicles, and subsequent safety requirements are well understood.
  • We are piloting In Vehicle Monitoring Systems with a focus on influencing driver behaviour, and the safety of our personnel whilst operating in remote environments.
  • We recognise the importance of good journey planning, and have strong journey management processes for any personnel travelling between our sites.
  • We will be engaging with our contractors by sharing the learnings of all of our key light vehicle safety initiatives.

Similar strategies exist in all parts of our Australian operations, tailored to the unique risks each local operations identify.

Rio Tinto's Contributions to the NRSPP & Points of Contact

  • Steering Committee Partners
  • Founding Partners
  • High Occupancy Vehicle
  • Kevan ReevePrinciple Advisor Centre for Safety Partnership

    What are RioTinto’s NRSPP road safety commitments?

    1. Host October 2017 SC meeting in Perth
    2. Attend NRSPP Utilities Forum Fatigue/Sleep Discussion workshop
    3. Develop case study on how to make a bow-tie matter
    4. Convert the case study into a NRSPP webinar
    5. Support NRSPP Data Analytics Project with confidential sharing of data to assist the High Occupancy Vehicle Working Group
    6. Support the High Occupancy Vehicle Working Group

    Supporting actions delivered by Rio Tinto:

    • Recognised as a founding partner of the NRSPP.
    • Has attended 12 of the 19 Steering Committee meetings since inception of the NRSPP.
    • Rio Tinto Utilities Division joined the 3rd NRSPP Utilities Forum which was kindly hosted by the Water Corporation in Perth.
    • Rio Tinto kindly hosted  the 15th NRSPP Steering Committee in Perth in 2017.
    • Helped establish in 2017 the NRSPP High Occupancy Vehicle Working Group, shared data and their Bow Tie on this related risk. Was willing to provide $25,000 to assist with research to help develop a good practice management system for HOVs.
    • In 2018 developed with NRSPP the case study Rio Tinto: The safety loop – CRM program, bow ties and preventing fatalities and serious injuries
    • Expanded on the case study with the Webinar: how can a linked CRM-Bow Tie approach prevent fatalities and serious injuries?
    • In 2021, Rio Tinto assisted NRSPP with its medicinal marijuana research by sharing how it’s international operations in Canada and the US address this issue.
  • Rebecca PerrettPrinciple Advisor Centre for Safety Partnership

    Rio Tinto is recognised as one of the Founding Partners of NRSPP with Rebecca Perrett kindly helping to design and build the foundational elements of the program during its establishment phase.

    NRSPP wishes to recognise the contributions of Rio Tinto for helping develop the program.

  • Kevan ReevePrinciple Advisor Centre for Safety Partnership

    Rio Tinto kindly supplied their organisational data relating to High Occupancies Vehicles which helped provide insights in relation to understanding the type of incidents and claims these vehicles have been involved in and trends over time. Their HOV activities include:

    • Established the High Occupancy Vehicle Working Group and attended the kick off meeting which was hosted by BHP Melbourne, Perth and Brisbane offices on the 24 May 2018.
    • Shared their HOV bow tie and related data with NRSPP to analyse the related risk.
    • Rio Tinto were willing to invest $25,ooo in the HOV research to understand the problem, sadly only BHP was willing to invest and other partners were not.

    The HOV working group was placed in Maintenance mode when only two partners with these vehicles were willing to participate in potential research projects to understand the risk and develop solutions.