Targeted Inspections: Refurbishment Sites

In much the same way that you might have wondered why details of police mobile camera sites are advertised, or if not advertised, at least made available to the general public in advance, so it is with the Heath and Safety Executive’s construction division. So here’s your warning alert if you happen to be in construction and working on a refurbishment at the moment!

They’ve done it before. Between the summer of 2007, February 2008 and March 2009 HSE Inspectors carried out over 4,000 nationally, all of them targeting refurbishments.

You might wonder why…and there again, you may not, because we suspect that any of us in this particular area of construction will tacitly admit that, especially on smaller jobs, it’s possible to sometimes be just that little bit less than fastidious with our Health and Safety, and it’s just not worth it!

So, what will the Inspectors be particularly interested in when they drop in to visit you? Amongst other things it will be looking at the risks associated with potential falls and general good order around the site, and, of course, any asbestos removal.

Why not ask us to visit your site before the HSE does? We’ll be able to advise on anything they may pick up, and save you both hassle and money!

Employees, know thyself!

There’s an assumption we all make that it’s the job of an employer to protect their employees; and so it is. But is goes deeper than this, because it’s potentially also the job, the responsibility, of the employer to make sure that employees look after each other, and this area of Health and Safety is one that is often not addressed.

 A recent case demonstrates this, with a demolition worker having been sentenced to 120 hours of community service, plus a fine of £500 for having taken got into an excavator, lost control and caused the collapse of a wall onto a colleague’s leg, which was badly broken as a result.

One possible response to this could be that the demolition worker got what was coming to him, but there are other things to consider. Had he been specifically instructed and trained by his employer as to the limit of his responsibilities? Why were the keys left in the excavator? And what cost the considerable inconvenience and bad press?

A better option? Talk to us at FRS and allow us to make sure you have every eventuality covered!

New Charges from The Health and Safety Executive

“Central to the scheme is the fact that compliant businesses will pay nothing.”  That’s what the report entitled the “Outcome of the Consultation on the Fee for Intervention Scheme” states quite clearly in Paragraph 2, and the intention is clear, that there’s a level playing field for those who meet their legal obligations and comply with all the various legislative demands of the HSE, and that those who don’t will have to “meet their obligations” and that any costs a business ends up having to pay will be “in its own hands”, in other words, fail to get it right and we’ll make you pay!

 So, what might it cost if your Health and Safety policies and procedures aren’t quite as tight as you think they are?

Answer: £124 an hour, starting from April, and starting from the moment a letter of email recording the duty-holders breach is sent, that’s £124 an hour for as long as the HSE reckons it takes to correct the problem, which, if it involves a number of visits and traveling time, could add up to rather a lot…

 The option?  Consider the exceptional value offered by FRS! For rather less than £124 per hour we’ll make sure that you’re compliant in all areas of your Health and Safety, so none of this stuff will even apply to you; a better proposition altogether!

 Jan 17 2012

We won’t be the first to tell you that the New Year is always a good time to make a promise of some sort, we tend to call them resolutions, but somehow a resolution is easier to break than a promise, so at FRS we call them ‘promises’ so there can be no mistake! The promise we’d like all our readers to consider making this year is to get your Health and Safety policies completely up to scratch and compliant.

They are already? Well, are you sure? The snag with this area of the law, because that’s what it is, is that it keeps changing, and, unlike a lot of law, it changes retrospectively. What was legal, acceptable and absolutely right last year could be wrong this…and the trouble is that if, heaven forbid, something was to happen and scrutiny suddenly fell on you, the fact that you were up to date last year wouldn’t help you now!

So, what to do? The answer, of course, is to call your local friendly Health and Safety experts, us! We’ll be able to tell you whether what you’re doing meets all legal requirements and make sure that you’re working to best practice too, and then…peace of mind and the certainty that you’ve done everything you possibly can to protect yourself, your workforce and your business, because the truth is…doing nothing is no longer an option!

Roof-lights keep falling on my head….

Did you know that falls through fragile surfaces, particularly fibre-cement roofs and roof-lights accounts for almost 25% of all fall-from-height fatal injuries in the construction industry?  And that those who were carrying out small, short-term maintenance and cleaning jobs account for a significant proportion of those fatalities?

 Of course the truth is that our mental attitude often runs down the lines of “It’s only a quick job…I’ll be OK” and, even worse, “It won’t happen to me”. But what a mistake this attitude can be!

 And it’s not just in the construction industry.The law is quite clear about this, it says that contractors and employers must manage the danger by avoiding work on, or near, fragile surfaces, and controlling any remaining risk by use of stagings, guard-rails and fall arrest systems.

 But that’s not enough, those who might potentially be at risk, which of course includes you as well as your employees, must be told what the necessary safety precautions are, and those actually doing the work have to be trained and instructed in the precautions required.

 What this means in practice is that the days of nipping up a ladder and across a roof to do a quick job are long gone, and that the substantial risk you face is not just of in the injury but in the subsequent action for having let such a thing happen.

 As our strap line says: Doing nothing is no longer an option! As with all elements of Health and Safety it's just not worth getting it wrong…so why not call us in to check that your policies and procedures meet the requirements, and maybe allow us to train your people to the required standard?  Go on…you know you should!