Health & Safety

• Construction Industry death on the increase
• Safety Helmets
• Respiratory Protection
• Hearing Protection
• Health & Safety Protective Footwear

There is one big issue in construction this year and that is safety. There has been a 59% rise on last year in the number of deaths on construction sites and the Government has made it clear that if the industry cannot come up with measures to stop the rising death toll it will intervene.

Last month the industry's main employers body the Construction Confederation declared a "zero tolerance" towards poor health and safety practice.

John Gains, Construction Confederation president and chief executive of Mowlem said that it was time to acknowledge there was no acceptable level of accidents.

This historic decision suggests there is a serious desire to change.

Now contractors seem ready to interrogate subcontractors about safety regimes and hold them to it. This simple change in culture would go a long way to making sites safer.

Few people working in construction realise that being hit by a moving object or vehicle accounts for the second greatest number of fatalities.

21 deaths and 872 serious accidents according to last year's annual Health and Safety Executive figures.

Falls account for the greatest number of fatalities, in fact 26 deaths and 1,540 serious accidents.

To instill the message Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott hosted the industry's first safety summit in London on February 27. This unique event brought together leading figures from employers, unions and the Health and Safety Executive. They have laid down an outline safety action plan. In the following weeks the industry will put flesh to the bones setting out the challenges and how they will be met.

One of the key targets unveiled by the Construction Industry Advisory Committee will be to reduce the number of major accidents and fatalities by 40 per cent by 2004, and by 66 per cent by 2009.

A safety representative at one of the major contractors said: "These are a set of ambitious targets.

"It will mean a radical change and can only happen if the industry starts to take ownership of the workforce."

The signs are this could turn out to be the case.

Improving safety is also about pre-planning, taking sensible precautions and enforcing them.

Cutting the death toll and numbers of serious accidents caused by moving objects should be a quick win. Visibility and vigilance become the watchwords. In effect this means equipping all construction workers with hi-vis clothing and always using lookouts when vehicles are moving.

This simple regime would go a long way to putting the new health and safety targets being proposed by Government well within reach.

If everyone takes a stand it will go a long way to changing the current "tolerant" culture and making sites safer.

Checklist:

Contractors should interrogate subcontractors about their safety regimes and ensure they are adhered to.

Contractors need to make sure that they are buying "suitable and sufficient" PPE for all their workers.

Suppliers of PPE need to check that they are offering compliant products for sale. Manufacturers of PPE need to be sure that any component parts used in the making of PPE are of sufficient quality.

Checking that the high visibility garments are still in working order - If they are dirty, ripped or torn they will no longer offer protection. As with any item of PPE hi vis garments must be maintained.

Aaron Morby, editor of Construction News reports on the rise in deaths in the

Can You Spot the Difference?

How 'legal eagle' are you when it comes to recognising high visibility garments that comply with standards and regulations?

In the last issue of Hi Vis News - in response to several requests from customers - we published a guide to the labelling demands of EN471, the European standard for high visibility clothing.

This article received the highest number of requests for further information, than any article published so far in Hi Vis News. By popular demand, therefore, we are repeating our labelling checklist.

But before you read on, can you spot which one of these garments can be legally worn as an item of PPE?

The correct answer is the bottom one - because it contains a garment label inside!

A conforming garment must be labelled, labelled accurately and securely attached, remaining visible for the entire life of the garment. This should take into account usage, storage and survival through wash processes.

Labels should contain the correct name, trademark or manufacturer identification, product type, size, commercial name or code, reference to the Standard pictogram and, if applicable, level of performance.

All high visibility clothing must be CE marked and refer to test house EN471 certification.

Remember, without a label, not only is a garment non-compliant, it may offer no protection at all.

Sharp Rise in Penalty Costs

The law is getting tougher on those companies who continue to flout health and safety regulations and as we have seen in previous editions of Hi Vis News as well as risking lives, sub-standard PPE now makes companies highly vulnerable to expensive penalty clauses.

The Health & Safety Executive (HSE) has, for the first time, issued a list of all such offenders convicted during 1999/2000. In doing so it is delivering on one of the main points in the HSE/DETR Revitalising Health & Safety strategy document issued in 1999.

This list of prosecutions is available on the HSE website www.hse-database.co.uk/prosecutions/

Recent prosecutions include: A large supermarket chain fined £425,000 and ordered to pay full prosecution costs of £75,000, following the death of a worker crushed by a reach truck at the company's distribution depot.

In a similar incident a large construction company was fined £100,000 when a road worker was knocked down and killed by a reversing traffic management vehicle during routine night maintenance work in a coned-off fast lane on the M25.

These cases are by no means rare. The HSE 'failures' list contains several six-figure fines and throughout 1999/2000, 28 per cent more charges were brought. The average fine rose by 39 per cent.

Remember - The law demands that all employees have adequate personal protective equipment and that buyers and suppliers ensure that this equipment meets the performance criteria laid down by European standards.