Corporate Social Responsibility

Corporate Social Responsibility – a high performance
company working to build a sustainable future

Premier Farnell takes seriously its role as a responsible corporate citizen and seeks to take account of the economic, social and environmental impacts of its operations. It is our belief that acting in this way is a source of business opportunity, improved competitiveness and sound business practice.

We have defined Corporate Social Responsibility as the sustainable development of our business – balancing our responsibilities to our shareholders, the environment and society. We believe that by releasing the power of individuals within Premier Farnell, we can have a positive impact on society and reduce our impact on the environment.

As an organisation with strong core values, we are driven to deliver results by being totally reliable, resourceful, customer focused and by conducting ourselves with integrity. These values translate into every aspect of our business. Our CSR programme is helping to create an organisation in which our employees are proud to work and in which our stakeholders have confidence.

Our programme is focused on our environmental impacts; the communities in which we operate; our people; trading ethically with our customers and suppliers and the health and safety of our employees.

We have been a member of the FTSE4Good Index of Corporate and Social Responsibility since its launch in July 2001 and the Group is also a member of Business in the Community (BiTC), a movement of 700 of the UK’s top companies committed to improving their impact on society. We participate in the BiTC Corporate Responsibility Index and were one of the biggest improvers in the Index results announced in 2007.

Our programme and reporting follow the framework used in the BiTC CR Index, facilitating the external validation of our programme. We use the feedback from our submission to assist us in identifying those areas where we should focus our efforts.

Every year we identify, publish and report against specific improvement targets in this CSR report and have been doing this since 2002.

The Board has overall responsibility for establishing the Group’s CSR policies and the Chief Executive Officer is accountable for ensuring that the Group operates in accordance with these policies and reviews progress on a monthly basis. Reporting of our performance is led by the Company Secretary and the Board receives a report on the Group’s CSR performance at least every six months. Periodic updates are provided on the www.premierfarnell.com website.

A copy of our Corporate Social Responsibility Policy can be obtained on our website at www.premierfarnell.com/premier_farnell/csr or by contacting Caroline Walker, Group Head of CSR and Environmental Affairs on +44 (0)113 387 5282.

Note

References to years throughout the CSR report are to calendar years, rather than the Company’s financial year. Data is presented in this report in two ways: the absolute total quantity of usage/generation and, to provide a method of assessing relative performance from year to year, unit rates based on sales turnover (i.e. quantity per £1,000 of sales).

Highlights of the year

Our major achievements this year have been:

• A further improvement of 10% in our rating in the BiTC CR Index putting us in the silver category;
• The implementation of a plan to continue reducing carbon emissions to the lowest practicable and economic level;
• The development of our approach to sustainable procurement;
• Over 150 teams across the Group made and delivered community and environmental commitments during the year;
• The appointment of a full-time Group Head of CSR and Environmental Affairs;
• Positive feedback from our employee engagement survey in which the CSR section achieved the highest score of all major indicators; and
• Monthly feedback of progress on objectives to CEO.