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Christmas to Remember

James Monaghan — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 10:10:18 +0000

On the 25^th of December most of the world will be celebrating the birth of Jesus, the festivities will be widespread and each will be celebrating it in their own particular way, some will be partying the night away while others will be having family and friends round for dinner.

This year there will be some memorable moments as children play next to the Christmas tree, adults laughing, joking and watching some classic TV. However there is a serious side, for some people this will be a Christmas that will not be forgotten.

Christmas safety not only applies to making sure that all the plastic and paper wrapping is disposed of properly but that all their Christmas Lights are properly wired and that are safe for that purpose.

Let’s be honest, how many of us actually check all our Christmas decorations, each year we take them down bundle them into a box place them in the attic and forget them till the following December.

This year more people are going green and buying a real Christmas tree that can be replanted in the garden (this is great) but on a serious side these trees have to be kept moist, do not let them dry out as they become a fire hazard as you Christmas lights start to heat up.

If the instructions are followed properly this tree will give you years of enjoyment but as the video shows it only takes seconds to make this a Christmas to remember.

Festive Fear

James Monaghan — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 16:42:25 +0000

This time of year we actually enjoy going to work, employees walking around with smiles on their face’s whistling and singing Christmas carols. Christmas songs being blasted out across the airwaves as Directors and office staff walk through the factory talking to everyone, there is a joyful mood in every workplace, although much of this exuberance is not due to Christmas Day it’s down to the works night out.

On the day of the Christmas party the talk within the workplace changes from work, to what people are wearing and who will look the sexiest amongst the office staff, not much production is done, it’s a day spent in high spirits doing maintenance as all machines get greased, oiled and washed down, much of the chat is about the night out. It’s a great feeling when the supervisors tell everyone they can leave early in order to get ready for the nights festivities.

The night starts off in great spirits, everyone in the pub having a great laugh, the boss buying drinks for his employees, everyone laughing as the young apprentices trying their luck with the office staff, groups of people starting to form as the pub fills up.

Britain has one of the worst records in Europe for binge drinking and it’s not long before people are downing the aftershock and slamming back the tequilas. At this time the innocent Christmas kiss can be taken in the wrong way and the man or woman that was your workmate is now following you around the pub thinking they will be getting much more than a kiss.

At this time of year, think about your actions, if you have too much to drink and think that you can take advantage of a work colleague against their wishes you will end up being arrested, may have to attend court and put on the national sex register, along with this you will lose the respect of your family and friends and even lose your job.

This Christmas drink responsibly and keep the respect of all who know you!

Bad Hair Day

James Monaghan — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 14:20:25 +0000

It has been reported in the media that hairdressers have to put under tighter controls when it comes to training and handling of dangerous chemicals such as peroxide and bleaches. Although there are guidelines that are set out by the Health and Safety Executive in Control of Substances Hazardous to Health Regulations 2002 (COSHH SR11) this is only for guidance and is not compulsory.

At the moment there is no regulation to say a student can or cannot legally mix hair colours and peroxides to be placed on another person’s head. If these chemicals are mixed wrongly or the client has not been tested for any allergic reaction, this may lead to damage to another person such as severe burns, swelling or even in rare cases anaphylactic shock.

Hairdressers only requirement is that they register their company with their local council, however there are no legislation which applies specifically to the hairdressing industry. They can register with the voluntary organisation The Hairdressing Council but of the 130,000 hairdressers in the UK only about 10% have registered. Habia (Hair and Beauty Industry Authority) says “The health and safety checks by local authorities are generic and not specific to the hairdressing industry”.

If trainee hairdressers are left unattended with no little or no supervision the consequences can be catastrophic not only to their clients but often to themselves. It is estimated that nearly 70% of all hairdressers contract some kind of skin damage during their career and most of these are totally preventable.

One of the biggest dangers to hairdressers is dermatitis this is caused when unprotected hands come in to contact with bleaches, peroxides, shampoos and in and out of water every day. There are several ways that can be done to protect your hands such as:

• Wearing disposable non-latex gloves when shampooing, rinsing, and when using bleach and peroxides.
• Use a good quality barrier cream, normally paraffin based ones is best.
• Dry your hands thoroughly.
• Remember to change your gloves between clients.

As an owner of any business you have to monitor what your employees are doing, carry our proper risk assessments and keep training records, only when your employees are competent and can carry out duties to an acceptable level that they should be allowed to do their profession.

Preventing back pain

James Monaghan — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 14:47:08 +0000

One of the most painful experiences there is, has to be the endurance of back pain, it just will not go no matter what you do, where you sit or where you lay, it is with you day and night. Most occurrences of back pain are not down to any disease it’s more likely to due to something that you have done yourself for instance:

Heavy lifting, where you have had poor or no training in manual handling.
Being in employment where you have to constantly stoop, bend or reach.
In an employment where you are doing the same action every day.
Driving long distances, not taking breaks.

As an employer you have a legal responsibility to carry out proper risk assessment to protect your employees, this should include looking at all the hazards, decide who might be harmed and how it can be avoided or actions taken to keep hazards to a minimum. There are several applications that can be taken into consideration such as:

If heavy loads are involved is there any way that they can be moved with out lifting manually, fork truck, pallet truck or rollers are good ways of lifting and moving heavy materials.
Consult with your employees ask their advice, they are the ones doing the work they will know all the dangers or hazards within a particular job sector.

As an employee you have to report any discomfort to your back or limbs immediately to your manager or Health and Safety representative, you can also help yourself by taking regular breaks and if you are sitting at a computer you have to get up and stretch, doing these simple measures will help you from hours of pain.

Home Safety

James Monaghan — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 13:23:59 +0000

We all know that many disciplines for life begin at home, actions like cleanliness, good manners and health and safety. We show our children how to wash and stay clean and try our best to teach them what’s right and wrong. It is also our responsibility to make them as safe as possible while they are in our home.

It has been recently reported that health and safety inspectors will be allowed access into peoples homes to asses their health and safety measures. The new guidelines set up by the Department of Health will be looking for smoke alarms, safety gates, fire guards and further safety features in people’s homes. Hospitals, doctors and social service records will be looked at to find families which are constantly in breech of health and safety regulations in their own homes and all the information will then be stored on a national data base which will accessed by councils, NHS bodies, housing associations, police and the fire brigade. The paper which is up for consultation has been criticised by various groups saying it is an intrusion of family life.

This is a paper that will cause much controversy within many groups and departments across the country, but no matter what they say they cannot dismiss the fact that each year:

Over 20,000 children under the age of five are taken into hospital with suspected poisoning.
Over 390,000 children under the age of fifteen are taken to hospital with injuries resulting from a trip or fall.

There are many hazards in everyone’s home and it’s down to each individual to assess the dangers and act appropriately, however, I wonder if many families have no safety measures in their homes – could this be down to purely financial reasons?

If that is the case which department will be responsible for handing out money/vouchers for the families to buy the required health and safety equipment to make their homes safe? If indeed money or vouchers are to handed out which department will be responsible for ensuring that the proper health and safety equipment is purchased and properly fitted?

Catch it, Bin it, Kill it!

James Monaghan — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 13:18:18 +0000

As the autumn turns into winter we can start to see and hear its effects all around as people next to us start sweating, coughing and sneezing, in recent years this was tolerated as people had to get to work. In today’s society this is not acceptable, swine flu is not a virus that has been made up by some ‘nutty professor’ it is a real danger and it has the ability to kill.

All employers and employees have to show some good hygiene measures in the workplace whether it is placing boxes of tissues next to work areas or even allowing employees the option of wearing facemasks.

Some good precautions are, that if you have to cough or sneeze place a hanky up to your face covering your mouth and nose once you have sneezed or coughed place the hanky in a bin promptly and securely, now wash your hands, wipe clean all door handles and hard surfaces with a good cleaning product.

So you think you may have swine flu?

Typical symptoms of swine flu will include:

A fever (a temperature of over 38°C/100.4°F)
Symptoms of malaise.
Headaches.
A sore throat.
A dry tickly cough.
Some may have diarrhoea and vomiting.

The government have started to dispense swine flu vaccination this week to the groups that are most at risk, these will include the aged, the sick and doctors that visit people’s homes. If we all carry out simple precautions we can overcome this swine flu pandemic.

Proper Risk Assessments Prevents Deaths

James Monaghan — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 13:50:17 +0000

Over the last few months many of our countries firms, directors and school governors have been fined for failing to ensure that health and safety regulations have been upheld. Health and Safety is not just a title given to certain people to make them feel important, this is a real responsibility with real consequences if you get it wrong.

Proper risk assessments have to be completed for any job that may injure an employee or a member of the public. They do not have to be lengthy documents as long as that all the dangers and risks are identified and procedures put in place to limit or control any chance of accidents. Doing a proper risk assessment could prevent the premature deaths of more than 240 people each year and over 150,000 people getting injured.

Companies have to ensure that their Health and Safety procedures are all up to date and that all employees are aware of any changes made to the procedure, again this will prevent any accidents.

In recent weeks there have been several cases where if a proper risk assessment had been done, the out come would have been much brighter for all concerned.

The Governing Body of the of a school in England should have ensured that a proper risk assessment was done, as the pupil made a plaster of Paris cast of her hands, as the hydrated plaster warmed up it caused severe burns to her hands, the burns were so severe that she has had to have them all amputated but two. The school was fined £16,500 and £2500 in costs.

In another case a director, who was in charge of health and safety for the company was fined a total of £14,000, again for not ensuring a proper health and safety risk assessment was done. The director failed to ensure that all access to a machine was sealed off and safety barriers fitted, when an employee entered the area to repair a snag in the machine, it started winding thus trapping the employee with serious consequences.

Remember Health and Safety is there for everyone’s benefit and not just a selected few.

Deadly Guests

James Monaghan — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 12:08:15 +0000

Micro organisms are present around most of us most of the time, most are harmless to humans. The fact is most are beneficial to the human race, they make about 50% of the oxygen we breath, make medicines for us and even help break up oil spills that we are responsible for.

However its not all one way, some micro organisms will cause infections, allergies and even death. Most people will rarely come into contact with harmful micro organisms, however there are some industries where this is a daily occurrence, hospital and health care workers are exposed to many different micro organisms, it is estimated that for every 100,000 nurses 30 are infected by some sort of organism and 100 out of 100,000 care workers in residential homes are infected although most of these infections will make us feel unwell.

There are more deadly infections, more than 4 health workers have died and another 9 are infected from HIV due to being ‘pricked’ by an infected needle.

People don’t have to work in the health service to contract micro organism related diseases, farmers and zookeepers are just as at risk from infection than health workers.

There are an estimated 300,000 people that are directly at risk from ‘Zoonoses’ (diseases that can be passed from animals to humans). In the UK there is approximately 40 Zoonoses identified which cause harm to humans, although these are self limiting there is evidence that the effects are now lasting longer than originally thought.

HSE operates and enforces legislation that controls micro organisms that may harm humans at work, Control of Substances Hazardous to Health (COSHH), these regulations cover all hazardous (including biological agents) this regulation requires all employers to assess the risks of exposure, and to prevent exposure and control it adequately.

Risk Assessments Saves Lives

Paul Steven — Thu, 21 May 2009 08:49:53 +0000

On May the 12th 2009 a little 2 year old boy walked across a busy fairground from the bouncy castle to the ‘Go- Gator’ ride, where he sustained substantial head injuries, he was unfortunately pronounced dead at hospital. The accident happened at Manning’s fun fair, Ducketts Common in Haringey. Although the HSE and the local police are still investigating this tragic incident, is there anything else that could have been done to prevent any person from entering moving parts of your machinery?

A proper risk assessment has to be done to identify all the risks which can cause real harm. Your risk assessment does not have to be a complicated series of rules and regulations. Your risk assessment should start off by asking what kind of dangers are present.

To identify these you should walk around your site looking and taking notes, ask the workers as they are often the people who see the hazards at first hand.

For each hazard you have to decide who will be harmed, try and group people, for example pregnant mothers, young children and the disabled. Again ask your employees as there might be something you have missed.

Once you have identified the risks you have to do everything ‘reasonably practicable’ to protect people from harm. Once all the hazards are identified write them down, document them, this will give the people working around you an idea of what to look for, make sure that all employees are aware of your findings as good training is essential.

Lastly, you should record any accidents that happen this will enable you to update your risk assessments. You have to reach a balance of the unachievable total safety and bad management which will cause harm to people.