Health and safety policies and work attitudes in Cypriot companies

► Positive work attitudes have a positive impact on safety climate perceptions of the employees. ► A good safety climate contributes to improved safety performance. ► Safety policies have a direct impact on safety climate and safety performance. ► Safety policies increase job satisfaction and organizational commitment. The purpose of the paper is to investigate the association of organizational health and safety policies and procedures (OHSPs) and safety perceptions of employees as reflected in safety climate with safety performance. Furthermore the impact of OHSP on work attitudes like job satisfaction and job commitment is also considered. Employee safety policies are considered within the context of a broader policy of corporate social responsibility. The study examines the need for formulation of a proactive safety strategy and its implementation. The research context is Cyprus, a small peripheral European country, which has a service-based, small firm dominated economy. Such an environment presents special problems and barriers in the formulation and implementation of safety policies and procedures and offers an interesting and so far relatively under-researched context for testing relationships between policies and safety outcomes. The results of this study illustrate that OHSP, safety climate, and organizational commitment have a statistically significant association with safety performance.