HEALTHY Heads in Trucks & Sheds has announced the appointment of a new director of industry relations and program management.
The new appointee, Melissa Weller, brings with her considerable experience including most recently as safety, health and wellbeing director at the Australian Trucking Association. She will commence at HHTS in mid-August.
Healthy Heads in Trucks & Sheds is a registered not-for-profit charitable foundation, established to improve outcomes in areas relating to psychological safety and physical wellbeing, across the road transport, warehousing and logistics industries in Australia.
The core vision of the foundation, which was recently joined by Ports Australia, is to coordinate a national approach to creating healthy and thriving working environments that can be adopted by all operators within the sector.
Ms Weller has worked in the road safety sector for over nine years, managing road safety projects and campaigns. She has led the evidence-based design of SafeT360, the trucking industry’s major public facing safety exhibition. And, managed TruckSafe, a comprehensive industry safety accreditation scheme which not only considers the technical and mechanical aspects of industry safety but also addresses human safety factors.
HHTS chief executive Naomi Frauenfelder said, “Melissa has been engaged with HHTS for nearly three years having been actively involved in a steering committee that was established prior to the foundation’s inception, working alongside industry colleagues to identify where support was needed regarding mental health and wellbeing in the Australian road transport, warehousing, and logistics industries.
“Since the Foundation launched in August 2020, Melissa has continued this engagement as a prominent member of the HHTS Standards Working Group,” she said.
“Melissa brings a wealth of valuable on-the-ground industry experience to HHTS, which will support the foundation in achieving its goal of industry-wide awareness and understanding of mental health and wellbeing.”
The ATA chairman David Smith said, “Melissa has been dedicated to making impactful changes relating to safety across the trucking industry during her four years at the ATA, her passion and enthusiasm for all areas of safety will be a great benefit to HHTS.
“Alongside the board I would like to extend my sincere thanks to Melissa for her dedication and drive as safety health and wellbeing director, we look forward to continuing to work with her at HHTS which is an important industry initiative that the ATA has closely supported.”
