Get your health and safety construction phase plan right first time – every time
A construction phase plan is a health and safety plan specifically created for construction. It’s a tailored plan for a construction project or work environment which ensures that key health and safety legislation is abided to and understood. This protects your business and your work force to minimise the risk of accidents and injury.
Construction comes with specific health and safety regulations due to the unique nature of the working environment and activities. With heavy loads, debris, construction tools and risks of falling, there are a number of issues which need to be assessed and addressed to keep everyone safe.
Formulating a construction phase plan is a legal requirement under the CDM Regulations 2007 a very worthwhile investment, and it’s even better value when construction phase plan templates are available from Veritas Consulting for only £60. This template allows you to analyse points which fully comply with CDM 2007 health and safety regulations. It’s a professionally created document which can guide you on exactly what to look at and how to formulate a credible and watertight construction phase plan.
Whichever form of construction phase plan assistance you choose, it’s a highly worthwhile investment, as it not only provides safety for the workforce, but also provides welcome piece of mind that all health and safety aspects have been properly addressed.
Click here to learn more and see samples of the £60 construction phase plan template from Veritas Consulting.
Health and Safety Audit – what’s working? what’s not?
Take comfort in the knowledge that you know your health and safety procedures are 100% correct with a health and safety audit
With all the complexities involved, can you be completely sure that your health and safety procedures are correct and efficient throughout your entire business?
If not, then a health and safety audit might be just the ticket.
What is a health and safety audit?
In an audit, every element of health and safety within your business will be assessed by experienced H&S experts. With this assessment, you will then be able to understand what is correct, what is not, and what can be improved. A health and safety audit will also ensure that your business is complying with all of the latest health and safety legislation.
Times change, situations change, staff change and, unfortunately, legislation can change too. That’s why it’s so important that your health and safety procedures are audited periodically, so you can keep up to date and make sure that your business doesn’t slip out of staying in line with the best health and safety practices.
There’s a lot to look at too:
Policies – Do they abide to the latest laws? Are they thorough and do they cover every necessary scenario?
Practices – Are they as safe as possible as well as efficient? Do they unnecessarily restrict productivity?
Staff – Do your staff have adequate information and knowledge to remain safe? Are managerial staff complying with their health and safety duties and responsibilities?
If you want any or all of these fields checked by an experienced and qualified health and safety expert who understands how businesses work, then Veritas Consulting can help. We’re available for comprehensive health and safety audits which suit your businesses premises, equipment and staff.
Hundreds of businesses have already realised the huge benefits from a Health and Safety Audit – Join them.
Health and Safety Advisors
Do you know how to get health and safety EXACTLY right for your business?
If there’s even a shred of doubt, then this could cause a mistake which results in non-compliance with H&S laws, compensation payouts, employee injury, or worse.
The simple fact is it’s worth making sure you’ve covered every health and safety angle to keep yourself, your employees and your business safe and well.
So what can you do to make sure?
The easiest method is to use a health and safety advisor – an expert who knows exactly what you would need to do to comply with all health and safety laws and keep your premises as safe as possible. A health and safety advisor would have expert knowledge in the latest health and safety laws, as well as experience in minimising risk and promoting safety in the workplace.
When it comes to health and safety advisors, there are a number of scenarios where they can be very beneficial and sometimes essential:
Health and Safety planning. Advisors can give you a way of understand all the regulations and how to fully comply with them
Policy planning. Health and safety handbooks, policies and rules all need to be created and understood within the workplace by you and your employees. Health and Safety advisors can help create them and make sure they’re watertight.
Solving complexities. Health and safety isn’t always straightforward in business. Sometimes it’s a minefield which you have to navigate through. A health and safety advisor can solve problems and provide solutions to any scenario.
Your next step…
If you need a health and safety advisor to take the effort out of your hands, then Veritas Consulting has some of the most highly experienced and skilled advisors in the UK.
Click here now to arrange a no-obligation discussion.
Popcorn from St John Ambulance
St John Ambulance have released their new campaign, ‘Popcorn’ to highlight about first aid set in a London cinema and the life saving benefits of first aid awareness. Accidents such as choking can occur anywhere, at any time and without the correct action taken, these accidents can be fatal.
Every year, 150,000 people die in situations where first aid could have saved them and St John Ambulance wants this to stop. Their hard-hitting, powerful campaign aims to raise awareness of this shocking fact and does so brilliantly.
For your free St John Ambulance first aid pocket guide text SAVE to 82727 or visit http://sja.org.uk/popcorn
Fire Risk Assessments – comply don’t fry
Fire Risk Assessments – Why they’re needed to meet regulations and look after your employees
Fire Risk Assessments are required by The Fire Safety Order 2005 UK Fire Regulations – and for good reason too! In a nutshell, a fire risk assessment is used to determine the chance of a fire occurring in any workplace premises. This assessment can then be used to create precautions within the workplace which reduce fire risks and help prevent fires from occurring.
This has three distinct benefits:
1. Applies with essential regulations
2. Makes sure that you and your employees are working in a safe environment when it comes to the risks of fire
3. Limits the potential for fire damage to your premises
How do Fire Risk Assessments work?
- Under the UK Fire Regulations, someone must be legally-designated the “Responsible Person”. This person then as the duty and responsibility to carry out the fire risk assessments and deal with the outcome.
- This can be anyone; either you, or a member of staff, or a separate company/individual if you cannot find anyone within your business who has the knowledge and expertise to confidently carry out a reliable fire risk assessment.
- The responsible person must use a fire risk assessment form, and then analyse the entire premises for any potential hazards which carry a risk of causing a fire. Any hazards which could cause further damage or danger in the event of a fire should also be taken into account.
- Once fire hazards have been identified and noted, precautions must then be decided upon if actions are required to reduce the risk of fire harm or damage
However, it may not be simple as that, as there’s one catch:
The UK regulations state that the responsible person must make a suitable and sufficient assessment of risks. The responsible person must also comply with the requirements and prohibitions stated in the order. If you do not have someone available who has the knowledge and expertise to do this, then your fire assessment may not meet requirements, and you may break the law. As well as requiring the ability to carry out the fire assessment, the responsible person must also be able to correctly remedy any hazards which are found. This may require knowledge of fire extinguishers, emergency plans, fire-resistance and so on.
For the sake of complying with the law, protecting your staff and protecting your premises, it may be worth hiring someone who can help. With Veritas Consulting, you can hire one of our fire risk assessors to assess your premises, carry out a detailed professional assessment, and make sure that fire risks are as limited as possible.
Click here to find out more about our fire risk assessments.
Health and Safety Services
Health and Safety Services – How to get through the regulation minefield
Health and safety is becoming more and more important in today’s working society. There are now swathes of complex and time consuming regulations, and it’s always as vital as ever to look after both yourself and your staff.
The Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999 stipulate that health and safety risks in the workplace should be successfully managed, whilst the business as a whole complies with a minefield of rules and regulations. The obvious primary importance here is to maintain the safety and wellbeing of those who work within the premises. However, making health and safety a priority can also limit staff/client accidents, and therefore limit the opportunity to have claims for damages and compensation taken against you. The costs of his occurring can be crippling for any small to medium size business.
How to comply with health and safety laws
Unfortunately, it isn’t as simple as a few paragraphs. The only real way to comply is to understand all regulations, and to do some thorough research on the HSW Act, rules and regulations to fully understand what you need to do. This can be an incredible burden for business owners, and a task in which you could seek the help of an expert.
Due to these reasons, and due to the importance of complying with the regulations and keeping staff safe, it can be worth investing in professional help from a business or specialist which has in-depth knowledge of the latest health and safety procedures.
So, what sort of health and safety services are there available to help?
Health & Safety auditing. An audit from an expert allows you to periodically find out if your business/premises is still fully complying with health and safety laws. It also helps you be aware of recommended or essential improvements so you comply with the law and keep workers as safe as possible.
Health & safety consulting. Seek the help of an expert to formulate emergency strategies, suggest solutions to hazards, help with H&S documentation and more.
Competent person service. Hire an expert as your businesses assigned ‘competent person’ (required by law) to oversee and manage all health and safety elements.
As you can see, there are many health and safety services available to businesses which can take the burden off their hands. Veritas Consulting offer all of these services and more. We have trained and highly experienced health and safety experts who can make sure that you comply with all regulations. Plus, we charge a fee which is affordable for medium and small businesses.
Click here to contact us to discover more about our health and safety services.
Practical steps that CDM Designers can take.
GOOD Designers can make a BIG difference designing OUT the risks
1) Health and safety should not be an afterthought. This is sometimes better understood by civil engineers than by designers of buildings because many civil engineering projects involve obvious and clearly defined risks. When designing a bridge to be built over a busy road the safety aspects of the operation have to be considered from the outset. There may be several ways of tackling the work. Building designers should learn to work in a similar way when choosing between design options.
2) There is no easy answer to deciding the importance that should be given to health and safety. Perhaps the best way to look at the relative weightings that could be given is to examine the consequences that will result from a choice or decision. In the end a professional judgement has to be made – it should be a decision that involves a proper exercise of judgement which takes account of health and safety issues.
3) The most important contribution a designer can make to improve health and safety often has to be made at the start of a project. Opportunities can be lost if health and safety is not considered at this early stage. Rather than looking on health and safety as a matter that can be postponed until other issues are out of the way, designers should deliberately bring consideration forward to ensure that the other issues are resolved in a way that eliminates risk so far as reasonably practicable.
4) The appropriate level of risk assessment will vary from project to project and from one operation to another. Where it is clear that there are serious hazards, a thorough study of the risks and a detailed method statement may be needed, eg when glazing is to be replaced over an active shopping mall or when explosives are to be used to open a channel through rock. The assessment may involve a detailed analysis but more often all that is appropriate is a simple judgement based on the seriousness of any incident that could result and the degree of exposure to the hazard. In a project that does not involve exceptionally hazardous operations, design reviews at key stages (eg before tender documents and working drawings are started) should help to identify hazards needing investigation. Sometimes it may be possible to avoid a hazard altogether but in many cases, where alternative methods of construction are possible, it will be necessary to assess the risks within each alternative so that safety measures can be considered and the health and safety aspects of alternatives can be taken into account.
5) There is a great deal of information in existence on construction health and safety. Although rarely written specifically for designers, much of it can be used by them when carrying out their duties under the CDM Regulations. Also of relevance is the health and safety legislation governing:
i) Materials (such as lead, asbestos and other hazardous substances
ii) activities (such as demolition or removal of contaminated soil);
iii) welfare requirements (including sanitary accommodation and first aid);
iv) environmental conditions (resulting from noise and dust);
In compliance with the above, Designers will need to have regard to :
i) the contractors who will be constructing the facility
ii) others who may be affected by the design requirements during its construction eg the public
iii) those who will have to maintain the facility
iv) those who may have to decommission/demolish the facility
As a consequence of the risk appraisal process the Designer should aim to eliminate risks, and lessen others. The significant residual risks, and information about these risks, need to be communicated by the designers to the CDM Coordinator.
CDM Coordinators will convey the information that affects the construction phase to the Principal Contractor via the Health and Safety Plan, and information that affects the maintenance or decommissioning phase to the Client via the Health and Safety File.
To help CDM Designers we have an excellent Design Risk Register if you would like us to send you a free copy please contact us.
Another article by Veritas Health and Safety Consultants and CDM Coordinators
