What’s New on the Web...

August Podcast now available

Our latest FREE podcast on revising for your NEBOSH exams is now available at www.rrc.co.uk/Podcasts.aspx

Tackling exams can be an unpleasant business. Even worse is the revision beforehand. Avoidance is always an option but here the team, together with Dee Arp of NEBOSH, give tips to students on getting through the process relatively unscathed.

Remember too that all of our past podcasts are also available on the RRC website.

NEBOSH News

NEBOSH Certificate in Environmental Management

RRC were one of a handful of course providers accredited to offer this new pilot course. The RRC e-learning course has proved to be a huge success with over 250 students now enrolled (and many more currently on a waiting list).

The pilot course is due to finish in mid-October 2008. NEBOSH will need to review the feedback on all the pilot programmes conducted but we hope a full launch will be available in early 2009.

NEBOSH International Diploma

Based on the NEBOSH National Diploma, this international qualification takes a risk management approach based on best practice and international standards instead of being guided specifically by a UK framework. RRC’s first NEBOSH International Diploma programme will commence next month, with Unit A available from 1 September 2008, and Units B, C and D available from 1 January 2009.

NEBOSH National Diploma in Environmental Management

A new syllabus has just been launched for this course which will take effect from the December 2008 examinations. This new syllabus has been updated to reflect changes in both legislative requirements and best practice within environmental management and it also now satisfies the requirements for membership of IEMA. RRC will be launching our new course later this month.

NEBOSH Level 2 Certificate

This short Level 2 course has been developed by NEBOSH to provide a basic introduction to the world of health and safety, as well as acting as an introduction to one of the NEBOSH Level 3 Certificates. RRC are well into the development of this new course and are just awaiting the formal launch by NEBOSH before making this available (subject to accreditation).

News In Brief

• The pilot of a holiday jet had to abort a landing at Blackpool airport in May when a group of youths were spotted near the runway. It was dark at the time and the alarm was raised by contractors. Police were called and the aircraft had to do another circuit.

• A teenage worker died in April 2003 when he fell through the roof of a superstore in South Wales. The boss of the roofing company involved pleaded guilty to a charge of manslaughter and was sent to prison for ten months by Swansea Crown Court in May 2008.

• The HSE has updated its advice and guidance for health and safety inspectors on dealing with asbestos in the workplace. The document can be downloaded from:

  http://www.hse.gov.uk/foi/internalops/fod/inspect/asbestos.pdf.

• Officers at Wigan police station put a visitor in handcuffs and took him to the custody suite as part of a demonstration. They couldn’t then release him because the mechanism of the handcuffs had jammed. They had to dial 999 and ask for assistance from the local fire station.

• The HSE Biocides and Pesticides Unit has made available online a list of new pesticide products that gained approval in April 2008 at:

  http://www.hse.gov.uk/biocides/copr/approvals/approvals0408.pdf.

• A hospital which carried out operations over weekends in an attempt to meet waiting-time targets made errors which resulted in the death of one patient and another having to have a leg amputated. University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust is now the subject of an investigation.

• A new website has been launched to complement HSE guidance on how to apply and use local exhaust ventilation (LEV) to remove airborne contaminants from the workplace before people inhale them. The address is:

  http://www.hse.gov.uk/lev/index.htm.

• A woman was crushed to death near London’s Tower Bridge in May when a bus hit a tree, causing it to fall. She had been walking along the pavement and the tree toppled onto her. Nineteen other people were injured in the accident, two of them requiring hospital treatment.

• A report in Occupational and Environmental Medicine by researchers at the universities of Sheffield and Manchester finds that solvents in paints can damage the quality of sperm. Their research showed that painters and decorators exposed to a particular solvent were 2.5 times more likely to have low-quality sperm.

• A bull escaped from a livestock centre in North Yorkshire in late May and ran amok on a dual carriageway, colliding with a car. Traffic was halted for nearly two hours as the police tried to resolve the situation. The animal was eventually shot by a police marksman, this being considered “the safest way” to bring the incident to an end.

• Surrey County Council has announced that no legal action is to be taken against the two animal health laboratories at Pirbright which were at the centre of the foot-and-mouth-disease outbreak last summer, due to lack of evidence. The Council had considered prosecuting the laboratories for breaching their licence conditions, but could not prove which was responsible for the escape of the virus because they shared the same drainage system.

• Anglia Ruskin University in Cambridge advised its students about to graduate not to throw their mortarboards in the air, as this tradition could damage the hats and cause injury. Several years earlier, a student had been struck on the head by a hat and had to be taken to hospital to receive stitches.

• The driver of a JCB digger died at the end of May when he lost control of the vehicle in heavy rain, crashed through a stone wall and plunged 50 feet down a cliff face onto a major road below. The accident happened in the Avon Gorge on a steep, twisting road as the driver swerved to avoid a line of cars. No other vehicles were involved in the accident and no-one else was hurt.

• The HSE has published an amended and updated edition of the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998 Approved Code of Practice to reflect the latest legislation. The Approved Code of Practice and substance of the guidance remain unchanged. It is available from HSE Books.

• A school in Shoreham, West Sussex, cancelled its sports day this year because the playing field is too uneven. The head teacher stated that the field used to be farmland and was full of cracks and holes.

• An elderly woman died in Leeds in June when a microwavable heat pack caught fire in her bed and she was overcome by fumes. Relatives had given her the wheat-filled heat pack to spare her the danger of scalding from filling a hot-water bottle.

• The water supply of 250,000 people was contaminated in June when a rabbit entered a tank at Anglian Water’s treatment works at Pitsford, Northamptonshire. The water became infected with cryptosporidium, a parasite that causes diarrhoea.

• Two directors of a bus company have been sent to jail for 15 months by Manchester Crown Court for allowing some of their mainly foreign drivers to work excess hours. The British limit is 13 days every fortnight but a Polish driver had been working for 19 days without a break when his bus hit a cherry-picker crane in November 2006, killing a signwriter. The directors had lied to an inquiry about the hours their drivers worked.

• The HSE has made available an online calculator for designers and suppliers of local exhaust ventilation (LEV) at:

  http://www.hse.gov.uk/lev/calculator.htm. By entering values a choice of LEV calculations may be made covering unit conversion, total and average values, volume flow, air change rate, air density and air velocity.

• The Government has promised to review its commitment to increasing the use of biofuels in vehicles, as this could worsen greenhouse gas emissions. The Transport Secretary commented: “We need to proceed cautiously until we can be certain that their expanded growth and use maximises the benefits and minimises the risks”.

• A summary of legislation on the legal responsibilities of employers is available from the HSE at: http://www.hse.gov.uk/leadership/legislation.htm. It outlines the responsibilities of employers under health and safety law, the Corporate Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide Act 2007, the legal liability of individual board members for health and safety failures (neglect), and related offences such as gross negligence manslaughter under common law.

• The HSE has a web page on its site giving details of the principal legislation that is enforced by the HSE and applies to mining work activities. Where guidance material is available it is referred to, but is mostly in hard copy form. The page is at:

  http://www.hse.gov.uk/mining/legislatlist.htm?ebul=hsegen/30-jun-20087cr=14.

• A primary school in Washington, Tyne and Wear, dropped the sack race and three-legged race from its sports day in case the children fell over and hurt themselves. The event was taking place in Edwardian period costume. Organisers wishing to minimise the risk to the children thought it “would be better to do hopping and running instead because there was less chance of them falling over”.

• The Councillors’ Handbook is a publication produced jointly by the Local Authorities and the HSE. It explains the roles and responsibilities of councils in enforcing health and safety regulations. It can be downloaded from:

  http://www.hse.gov.uk/lau/pdfs/councilhandbook3.pdf.

• A vicar in Cornwall had to resort to wearing a hard hat to work when gulls nested at St Petroc’s Church, Bodmin, and dive-bombed him as he approached. They were raising a chick, which was expected to fledge in a few weeks. In the meantime, churchgoers were distracting the parent birds with offerings of tuna.

• Two Royal Navy sailors and three fisheries inspectors who were preparing to board a trawler near Durlston Head in Dorset in July had to be rescued when their inflatable boat capsized. The inflatable was hit by a swell. One of the party required treatment for a head injury.

• The Healthcare Commission has revealed that some 5,000 patients abscond from mental health wards each year, resulting in over 200 violent incidents and harm to themselves and members of the public. 45% of nurses and 15% of patients on such wards say that they were assaulted last year. The violence is partly caused by overcrowding, guidelines recommending 85% occupancy while one in ten trusts has a rate of more than 100%.

• A flood occurred at the House of Lords at the end of July, which damaged several offices and computers on the second floor. Routine maintenance of the pure water storage facilities had just been carried out.

• The HSE has updated the information on asbestos licensing and the application process for applying for a licence. For details see:

  http://www.hse.gov.uk/asbestos/licensing/index.htm.

• The hamlet of Booze in North Yorkshire has had its postal service suspended following a health and safety assessment. Royal Mail found the track to the village from Langthwaite too hazardous for postal workers. Residents must now make a 30-mile round trip to Richmond to collect their post.

Nostalgia

By Alan Bessell

Do you ever get those introspective moments when you reflect back and wonder if it has all been worthwhile? I’d expect many readers to be new to H&S as a career, so I thought a view from my rear window might be of interest. As the flecks of grey in my hair increase and I read articles/editorials from the likes of Jeremy Clarkson and other “elf’n’safety” critics, plus some of the more whacky-bonkers-conkers stories and cases, these moments seem to come ever more frequently.

As a young graduate looking for work in 1975 the HSE appealed. Variety, freedom to roam and socially worthwhile thought I. Lord Robens had just ridden to the rescue and a brand new HSWA promised so much. 33 years later, a short time as an HSE Inspector, the remaining time as a poacher – including 15 years as a consultant – how do I feel? Read on dear colleague.

Successful Health and Safety in the Construction Industry Roundtable Event

At a time when the construction industry is arguably facing more changes and challenges than ever before in terms of health and safety (with stiffer penalties for non-compliance, an influx of migrant workers and the increasing need for drug and alcohol testing of workers), we thought it would be valuable to invite a number of health and safety managers and directors from some of the UK’s top construction companies to get together, face-to-face, to discuss the issues affecting the industry today.

The debate, held at RRC’s offices in London on 1 July, was lively and informative and covered such topics as whether the proposed Health and Safety (Offences) Bill would make a difference to the construction sector, whether high accident rates in construction are inevitable and how migrant workers can be trained to work safely.

Many thanks to all those who contributed. A full copy of the report will be available to download on the RRC website in September.

Noticeboard

The Importance of Low-Level Health and Safety Training

By Mark Dennis

Background

It is a contention of many employers today that their responsibilities for health and safety are either ‘new’ or ‘from Europe’ or both. However, for certain fundamental requirements, both statements are untrue. This is certainly the position so far as low-level health and safety training is concerned. There is a widespread lack of awareness of the importance of providing health and safety training for all workers. This article considers some reasons why the subject deserves more attention.

The legal obligation to give workers health and safety training is certainly not new. In England, case law has established the employers’ duty of care as common law for many years.

NEBOSH Best Candidate Award

Earlier this year, Paul Moore, an RRC student, was awarded the NEBOSH Best Candidate Award for the NEBOSH Part 2 Diploma. Unfortunately, Paul wasn’t able to attend the NEBOSH Graduation Ceremony which was held at the University of Warwick so RRC’s Director of Training, Dr David Towlson, collected the award on his behalf.

Congratulations again to Paul who was also awarded the NEBOSH Best Candidate Award for his NEBOSH Diploma Part 1 studies.

From left to right: Tony Cheeseman (WATA, sponsors of the NEBOSH Diploma Part 2 Best Candidate Award), Dr David Towlson, Colin Goodwin (Paul Moore’s colleague, accepting the award from David on behalf of Paul).

Exciting New Partnership with Industrial Care Alliance Training, India

RRC are pleased to announce an exciting partnership with Industrial Care Alliance Training (ICAT), based in Gujarat, India, to offer the NEBOSH International General Certificate and NEBOSH International Diploma by e-learning.

Following a successful pilot, RRC are pleased to have signed an agreement with ICAT to promote and help deliver RRC’s successful NEBOSH international programmes in India. We look forward to a successful relationship with ICAT over the coming years.

More information on Industrial Care Alliance Training can be found at http://www.ihs.co.in/.