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The achievements of the Aquatic Safety team at Belgravia Leisure have been acknowledged as industry leaders in the newly released Pool and Aquatic Facility Safety Assessments 2023/24 Annual Report.

The report showcases the Belgravia Leisure team’s outstanding performance, with venues achieving an average of 92.90% against the Guidelines for Safe Pool Operations (GSPO) in Australia. High performing sections including Aquatic Programs, First Aid, Supervision and Emergency Planning.

Overall, Belgravia Leisure venues outperformed the industry average in every Australian state where one was available for comparison with the group’s average safety score was listed as 89.3%, a result which is significantly higher than the industry means of 79%, as recently published in Royal Life Saving Society - Australia’s Sate of Safety Report for 2023.

In New Zealand, 100% of venues achieved their Poolsafe NZ accreditation with 50% of venues having under 10 items identified for rectification. 

A remarkable 106 aquatic related safety assessments in Belgravia Leisure managed venues were completed across Australia and New Zealand, up from 54 in the 2022/23 financial year. This increase was driven by the involvement of South Australia in their first round of assessments, Tasmanian venues reengaging in the process and the ACT venues transitioning over to Belgravia Leisure’s management.

The assessments were completed through Royal Life Saving Society of Australia, Lifesaving Victoria and Poolsafe NZ against the GSPO in Australia and the Aquatic Facility Guidelines in New Zealand.

Belgravia Leisure’s approach to continuous improvement across the industry as a whole has also been demonstrated, with the company completing about 30% of all assessments conducted across all aquatic venues in Australia.

Eager to put the data collected over the course of the year to good use, Belgravia Leisure Aquatic Safety Manager, Scott Vanderheyden commented “our strategy is certainly to leverage this centralised data - with a better understanding of gaps and hot spots in our performance - to focus the attention to create tools and resources that support our operations. We also intend to provide a range of training and education opportunities for teams to implement to further enhance safety in their venues.

“I’m proud of our results - we are not only achieving to a standard well above the Australian industry average, but we are continuing to improve and expand the number of participating venues while identifying areas where we could be performing to an even higher standard.

“I would also like to acknowledge the role that our Triple A’s for Aquatic Safety philosophy; Be Alert, Be Aware and Be Active, has had on our performance. This approach was developed by Belgravia Leisure to ensure that our aquatic personnel are proactive in preventing incidents and that we are ready to respond efficiently and effectively should an aquatic safety concern arise.

“At the end of the day, our teams and our patrons across Australia and New Zealand count on us to keep them safe and by continuing to keep safety at the front and centre of our operations, we are certainly delivering on this.

“I’d like to thank our Belgravia Leisure leadership team for the investment and priority of this process so we can continue our reputation as the industry leader in safety and compliance and provide safe venues for our local communities and contract partners.”

Images: Participants in a Belgravia Leisure GOSwim class (top) and Belgravia Leisure Aquatic Safety Manager Scott Vanderheyden (below).

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