Health & Safety

[johnlrichardson]

Just had the Health & Safety Executive (posh name for factory inspector ) out to the garage today. We have used wooden ladders for 25 years, but now they cannot be used in the garage, they have to be aluminium ones. No one can tell us why but the electricity companies MUST use wooden ones, which is understandable. Rules and regulations are the ruination of this country along with these people with NONE jobs.

 

jon

[miikae]

They may well have shares in Alcan by the sound of it plus they are discrimanating against the skilled joiners who make wooden ladders, the HSE will be the ruination of our country.

[philshelton]

Herpes Simplex Encephalitis

yes it is a disease well virus so there fore is bad for all :D

[Grizzly]

Shame on you for using wooden ladders.

You might get a splinter!

[Al Milton]

John,

 

You will also probably find that the ladders will have to be regularly inspected (12 monthly?) and certified, serial numbered and tagged, as ours have to be at work (large American company too concerned with avoiding litigation than applying common sense!).

 

Oh, and don't forget anything above 18 inches high can be classified as working at height these days, therefore 3 points of contact are recommended at all times, along with a harness and safety hat!!

 

Then there's the safety training for working at height, plus the associated risk assessments.

 

Oh, for the old days of common sense, where's it all going to end???

 

Al

[speedtripledan]

And is light works / inspection only over a short duration.

Being a cctv engineer the h/s really gets on my nips.... I,m not stupid enough to risk injury of myself and others just to fix a camera in any case if i did get injured the company i work for won,t pay sick pay thats more than enough incentive for me to be carefull

 

All this has come about because people take / took stupid risks.

 

In the end we all pay as the cost to my customers for double Manning and using powered access equipment to comply with H/S is high ( i work for all the major retailers )

[agent_zed]

the man on the advert installing a firealarm system was given the wrong ladder and look what happened to him he got £5000 and didn't even have to go to court! man have i seen that advert too many times.....

 

not sure how you have the wrong type of ladder unless it snaps in two or maybe it was a fruit picking ladder. My dad used a wooden ladder for over 20 years and never fell off, probably because he made sure he placed it correctly and didn't do anything stupid on it.

[Bob Tucker]

The HSE told Santa Pod that portable generators were too dangerous to be allowed, on account of the fuel being stored.

Guess how much race gas, methanol, nitromethanol, and just plain 98 octane is stored for the race cars, since there is no fuel available on site?

We now have to pay the POD between £25 and £50 for onsite generators to supply a whole grid of electricity on race weekend.

 

I do appreciate the quiet nights sleep tho'.....

[Knock-on]

I'll never forget when CART came to brands a few years ago.

 

There was a fireworks display and suddenly a disinterested voice came over the radio saying:

 

"Could someone pop down to the Ethanol tanks. There's an unexploded Firework and the Americans are getting a bit excited."

 

British Marshalls. That's why they're the best in the world. Kinda makes you proud

[johnlrichardson]

Only the boss can use the new ladder, it doesn't matter if he falls off because he is self employed.

If we go above 18ins we need scaffolding to change a light bulb or anything else over 18 ins,

just thought what that may involve; scaffolding someone to erect, it someone to say its correct, not sure how we get onto the scaffold, without using a ladder

 

jon

[Jamiep]

Its a shame it comes to this but some people are stupid, plain and simple, they need everything written down so they don't have the extra person there just to tell them how to do it. Once something is written down it becomes a standard which then gets adopted by others until it becomes a national standard which then becomes law.

Working on and around Gas terminals you kind of see why some rules have been brought in and recently in Hull a man fell from a ladder and was killed whilst working on a council house.

Not sure why you can't use wooden ladders though, scaffolders use them and there bl@@dy long too! all I can think of is weight.

[philshelton]

HSe is powered by the no win no fee sue culture we are now in the only way to resume normal service is for the courts to start saying "you got hurt because you were stupid" and send them on a common sense course. There are some good points to H&S that protect the employee but things are going to far IMO

[Guest phil howard]

I work in the offshore oil and gas industry which is heavily regulated by the HSE guidelines.

 

HSE is one of the area's that frequently gets 'high jacked' by 'jobs worths' who make a career out of loosing sight of reality.

Unfortunately you have to carry oout a full assessment on even the daftest safety issue.

 

One oil company had people being given warnings for not holding the handrail on the level section of floor because it had a stair case at either end.

They also couldn't put up Christmas decorations because the risk assessment could not be approved!!!!!!!

 

Unfortunately the people with little or no common sense are given the same credibility as the rest of us.

[Guest Jan]

Dont talk to me about ladders, Still suffering from a broken ankle from July last year, Using alluminium Telescopic Ladder that collapsed when I was up the top. I am now very carefull on ladders.

[Guest benham]

Less people (normally working class) are dying as a result of industrial "incidents."

 

We can get as "Daily Mail" about this as we want, but at the end of the day lives are very important things. Shall we go back to the days of no regulation, and simply seeing people as a dispoable tool?

 

I'm not saying I agree totally with all HSE regulation, but it's fine to get upset about it, but remember ultimately, it's for the protection of people.

 

Regards,

Andy

Edited February 15, 2010 by benham