Hughes and Salvidge are a well-established demolition and decommissioning business with its headquarters in Portsmouth. Their work takes them all over the country including projects at Heathrow and Gatwick. As one of the UK leaders in this sector, Hughes and Salvidge have built a reputation for health and safety, quality, and innovation.
Alongside SLR marine recruit, they have chosen to sponsor the Inspirational Women of Portsmouth awards which will be held on Friday, March 10th. To find out why they felt this is important and what they are doing to impact the lives of young girls and women in Portsmouth, the hosts of the award caught up with them to hear all about their efforts.
As you know, Pamodzi is all about bringing people together to celebrate the Inspirational Women of Portsmouth and the positive impact they have on their community so tell us about the activities you are doing to empower women in Portsmouth.
Hughes and Salvidge are proud members of the Portsmouth community, having had our Head Offices located here since 1964. Although we operate nationwide, most of our workforce is Portsmouth born and bred, and we regularly undertake projects in the city and the surrounding areas. Alongside our day-to-day activities – demolition, asbestos removal, concrete crushing, and metal recycling – we run internal initiatives to support Safety, the Environment, and Social Value within our team and the communities we work within.
Our Social Value Initiative, Helping Hands, promotes Charity, Community, Wellness, Development and Sustainability. One of our most valuable development actions from the Initiative is taking part in local learning and training events. There is currently a concern in the construction and demolition industries regarding the skills gap, and we need to encourage the next generation into the industry, as well as the one after that. Recognising that our industry is male-dominated, we make a conscious effort to interact with all children and students, particularly girls and women, to inspire them and boost their interest in our work.
Our teams regularly present to schools and colleges local to our projects about demolition, including how to develop a career in the industry and what distinct roles are available. We also invite schoolchildren to our sites, where safe to do so, so they can experience a demolition site first-hand, and hopefully get bitten by the demolition bug!
In 2022, we participated in iConstruct, a local event in Fareham that included students from schools across the area. The event involved an invented scenario where all construction/demolition trades would need to come together to complete a new hospital for the Solent area. The schoolchildren were required to interview the different companies present and gather information for a presentation they would give to judges. Our Health and Safety team and one of our directors took part, including helping to judge.
Development actions also cover our employees. As mentioned above, demolition is a male-dominated industry, but women are moving through the ranks in the industry as a whole and at Hughes and Salvidge. Our Board of Directors is made up of men and women equally, and we have women running our Environmental Department, our Accounts team, and our Business Development and Marketing Department. All these women are Portsmouth-based.
Tell us, what does supporting Pamodzi mean to you?
Hughes and Salvidge strive to support local causes, initiatives, and charities, and are keen to see the organisation achieve important things in supporting the women of Portsmouth, and beyond.
