24 December New Building Safety Bill for 2020 Although it has taken a lot of time to get here, we now seem to be on the verge of new Building Safety legislation. The government says the Building Safety Bill will “place new and enhanced regulatory regimes for building safety and construction products, and ensure residents have a stronger voice in the system” The … Read More
23 December Forklift Truck Overturn Forklift trucks often seem really solid and stable. This can change when simple tasks are performed, such as driving across a slope, or manoeuvring with a raised load. As a result, some forklift truck overturn risks are ignored. The Chorley based firm Staveley’s Eggs Ltd has been fined after a forklift truck overturned on a … Read More
23 December Effective Segregation and Safe Systems of Work When vehicles hit people, people invariably come off worse. This is just as true if the vehicle is a Fork Lift Truck. One of the simple Control Measures to put in place following your Risk Assessment is Adequate Separation of people and vehicles. While this may seem simple, it is too often ignored in some busy … Read More
23 December Fatal Crushing – No Safe System of Work The point of a Safe System of Work is self-evident: to provide a safe system for carrying out a (potentially dangerous) task. When I raise the need for these with clients, I am sometimes told that they are unnecessary, as everyone knows how to do it, or that nobody would do it differently/wrong. This case, … Read More
6 October Work at Height Introduction We are now several years on from the introduction of the introduction into UK law of the Work at Heights Regulations 2005. Despite that, not all organisations have come to terms with the implications of this law on their work activities. Many organisations still view the Work at Heights Regulations 2005 as construction-related legislation. The … Read More
27 September HSE – Health Inspection Initiative – October 2019 Between 7 October – 1 November, the HSE will be carrying out its latest construction inspection initiative. This will continue the focus on health, in particular, the measures in place to protect workers from occupational lung disease caused by asbestos, silica, wood and other dusts when carrying out common construction tasks. Why the focus of Health? … Read More
27 September Fall from a ladder leads to £120,000 fine Vertellus Specialties UK Limited have been fined after an employee fell two metres from a ladder and suffered a serious elbow injury. Carlisle Magistrates’ Court heard that in June 2018, at the company’s site in Northside, Workington, an employee was using a ladder to inspect a steam leak at height when the ladder failed and … Read More
27 September Large fine resulting from lack of planning of lifting operation Many organisations do not seem to grasp the need to plan lifting operations properly. In this case, the lifting operation is made more complicated because two forklift trucks were used. A Liverpool port operating company has been sentenced after a worker was struck by a load falling from two forklift trucks (FLTs) at the Port … Read More
24 September Fire Safety in Schools: a North/South Divide According to Zurich Municipal, which insures about half of all schools and universities in the UK, has carried out inspections at 1,000 schools and academies over the past two years. As a result of these inspections, they claim that about two-thirds of schools in England have poor fire protection systems and are not properly prepared for … Read More
23 September Worker died after fall from a scaffolding access ladder £53,000 fine after fatal fall from an insecure ladder An Aberdeen-based roofing contractor has been prosecuted by the HSE after a worker died when he fell from a ladder while exiting scaffolding. JF, a 56-year-old employee of Henderson and Aitken, fell from the top rungs of the ladder after it slipped sideways in Jute Street … Read More