27.11.2021

Oz based safety advisor for IPAF

The International Powered Access Federation (IPAF) has appointed Mike Ashton as international safety & technical advisor, based in Australia.

Ashton joins the organisation following a short spell as business development manager with Lift Industries, the Australian distributor for Terex Utilities in Gold Coast, Queensland. He began his access career in the 1990s with PTP, and was appointed as a senior instructor with UK rental company AFI in 2009, leaving after two years for a similar role at Nationwide Platforms.

At the end of 2011 he moved to Australia to join Brisbane based Access Service Australia as national training manager. In 2015 he moved to Dubai to join Rapid Access, Lavendon’s operation in the Middle East, as HSEQ & training manager, returning to Australia at the end of the year to re-join Access Service Australia’s Perth operation. In late 2016, he took a position with Australia’s powered access association, the Elevating Work Platform Association (EWPA) as resources manager. In 2018 he was appointed business development manager for Perth based parts and service company AWD, leaving for Lift Industries earlier this year.
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Mike Ashton

Ashton will continue to be based in Queensland, reporting to Brian Parker, head of safety & technical, who said: “The primary responsibilities of Mike’s role will be to use his skills and commercial expertise to advise, support and develop the safety and technical aspects of IPAF’s business around the world. Key functions will be to summarise complex safety and technical ideas, prepare how-to guides, white papers and manuals, create and edit content for internal or external documents, and to assist in identifying strategies and opportunities for safety and technical initiatives.“

“We’re delighted to appoint Mike following a rigorous search process and are confident he’s a perfect fit with the IPAF team and culture. He has valuable experience in the UK, Middle East, Australia and New Zealand powered access markets, and he will bring his obvious diligence and expertise to the role. We can’t wait for him to get started.”

Ashton added: “I have a long a varied career in powered access, covering engineering, training and business development roles here in Australia, the Middle East and the UK. I am passionate about safety and about demystifying the technical side of our industry, whether that is in disseminating sometimes complex technical guidance, leading on training and skills development, or winning and communicating with clients.”

“When I saw this role advertised, I felt it was an ideal opportunity for me. I hope to be able to lend my knowledge and expertise to assist IPAF in delivering important projects in terms of standards development and implementation, safety awareness and guidance, the global incident reporting project or the IPAF ePAL app for operators. I’m looking forward to this new challenge immensely.”

Chief executive Peter Douglas said: “I am delighted IPAF is able to announce this important addition to the Safety & Technical department – I’m sure that we have found the ideal candidate in Mike and he will fit in well to the IPAF culture, bolstering the team to help deliver significant progress against some of our key objectives, including incident reporting, collaborating on the development and implementation of new standards and in generating safety and technical guidance including the IPAF Toolbox Talks series of workplace safety briefings. We’re very happy to welcome him on board.”