Health and Safety. Myth of the month.

[joglynne]

I have just been looking through my Accountant's Monthly Newsletter and noticed this site as their Link of the Month.


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

[Anonymouse]

The one about Christmas decorations is not a myth...at least, not at our place. They are banned, for health & safety reasons - not that anyone's bothered explaining what those reasons are.

On the other hand, we are required to wear hi-vis jackets...indoors. In a warehouse that is lit with fluorescents 24/7. That hasn't been explained either. No, I'm not kidding.

[joglynne]

I think that's the problem with Health and Safety issues. Some employers will invoke the Safety Card as a way of dumbing down common sense.

The last office I worked at banned all Christmas Decorations based on a 'Racial' basis. When all the staff (a very multi-racial mix) challenged the ruling we were then refused permission to decorate our offices due to Health and Safety in the Workspace. Red Tape very aptly describes what it was all about. We eventually won the day on the understanding that we wouldn't decorate our monitors.

[Maggy J]

I know why the boss doesn't want decorations put up at Crimbo.

It's for the same reason that I never wanted my class to put them up.

A)Everyone gets over excited and behaves silly and B)nobody wants to take them down afterwards...

[joglynne]

Originally Posted by Maggy J

I know why the boss doesn't want decorations put up at Crimbo.

It's for the same reason that I never wanted my class to put them up.

A)Everyone gets over excited and behaves silly and B)nobody wants to take them down afterwards...

Civil Servants getting over excited ....never, Behaving silly....well that's another matter.

[Halcyon]

Originally Posted by Maggy J

I know why the boss doesn't want decorations put up at Crimbo.

It's for the same reason that I never wanted my class to put them up.

A)Everyone gets over excited and behaves silly and B)nobody wants to take them down afterwards...

Or that he is Scrooge.

[Anonymouse]

Originally Posted by joglynne

I think that's the problem with Health and Safety issues. Some employers will invoke the Safety Card as a way of dumbing down common sense.

'Common sense' is a contradiction in terms. Sense is extremely rare these days.

Originally Posted by joglynne

The last office I worked at banned all Christmas Decorations based on a 'Racial' basis. When all the staff (a very multi-racial mix) challenged the ruling we were then refused permission to decorate our offices due to Health and Safety in the Workspace. Red Tape very aptly describes what it was all about. We eventually won the day on the understanding that we wouldn't decorate our monitors.

But this wasn't in an office - I'm talking about the staff canteen.

And as for Scrooge allusions...well, we haven't had a Christmas dinner in 3 years, and the Christmas bonus went before I ever even started working there.

[zoombini]

We had decorations banned at work on the shop floor.

But for better reason than H&S, they are a very high static generator
and in an electronic manufacturing factory, thats a no no.

Paper chains are OK though

[Angua]

Or the complicated Fire Safety training we were supposed to do on line when no one has been physically trained on how to use the extinguishers anyway (sent the internet down at work). As the H&S chap form the County told me "all you need to know is how to get out of the building safely" and he would defy most people to actually manage to use the water filled extinguisher.

[joglynne]

Our H & S Officer took his job very seriously. In a 7 storey office block he insisted on checking every piece of electrical equipment that wasn't under the beady eye of the IT Crew every 2 months. He would close each floor down and pull the plug on fans and paper shredders etc, and in the mess rooms on each floor he would insist on testing the kettle, coffee peculators, hot plate and microwave oven.

Heaven help anyone found using an electrical item that hadn't got the latest little sticker on it.

Now this could have been good practice every 6 months or yearly if the checks were carried out sensibly by a qualified electrician but he was a pratt whose idea of testing each kettle was to time how long each took to boil! but never checking the plug. He wouldn't have recognised a faulty item if it stood on it's hind legs and bit him.

[punky]

I like Inspector Gadget's opinion on this (hat-tip to Dezzo for pointing me to this)

All I want is a cup of tea. I have served this nation for the best part of two decades, both at home and abroad. I don't want medals and I don't want more money. I just want some tea. But I can't have a cuppa because electric kettles are prohibited in my workplace. Our health and safety department has banned them in case we kill ourselves by electrocution, burning or drowning.

Ah, well. It's hot today, anyway. I switch on my desk fan. Ha ha - had you going there, didn't I? I'm not allowed to use it until it has been checked and stickered as 'safe to use' by one of the highly-paid staff who descend upon our nick every so often and examine everything.

Never mind. It's nearly time to clock off. Whoah! Almost caught myself out. The office clock's wrong. It's still showing GMT. We're not allowed to change the time. No, that would be dangerous and UNISON - the union of the official clock-time changers - wouldn't like it, so we have to wait for one of those pesky engineers from force HQ.

Last year I ignored this, got up on a chair and altered it myself. The next day, the nick's UNISON rep got up on a chair and changed it back to the wrong time. I kid you not.

Welcome to the public sector. The weird thing is, when Saturday comes, and I'm facing a dozen drunken, violent and dangerous yobs outside the taxi rank in the High Street, with only three PCs and a guardian angel on my side, our health and safety officers are nowhere to be seen.

Kettles and electric fans - too dangerous. Tackling 250lb of screaming, tattooed men when you're armed only with a 50g tin of pepper spray which doesn't work and an aluminium stick - you carry on, officer.

More from him here: http://inspectorgadget.wordpress.com

[Derek]

It's not all bad news though. We're allowed to change car tyres and bulbs again after previously needing to call the AA out.

Maybe a bit of common sense is (very) slowly creeping back into life.

[joglynne]

Originally Posted by Derek S

It's not all bad news though. We're allowed to change car tyres and bulbs again after previously needing to call the AA out.

Maybe a bit of common sense is (very) slowly creeping back into life.

Common sense or money pinching?

[Escapee]

Originally Posted by Derek S

It's not all bad news though. We're allowed to change car tyres and bulbs again after previously needing to call the AA out.

Maybe a bit of common sense is (very) slowly creeping back into life.

In our company Health and Safety has stopped the full time driver/chauffers from washing or cleaning the vehicles. (Apparently because they had not been trained)

A company is now contracted to wash and clean the vehicles.

I have had H&S visit the facility I am responsible for, there were probably many potentially dangerous tasks being carried out. (Dangerous from the nanny state H&S point of view) I think it was all a bit technical for them so they just gave their permission for the facility, wrote a risk assesment and have not been seen since.

[jonbxx]

The other side of the coin is this - Playground Scrapes Cost Schools £2m Most Health and Safety work now is to protect the stupid against themselves and to protect the company/organisation from being sued.

Where I work, I've had 7 online Environment, Health and Safety training courses this year and we have a very strict policy document stating where our responsibilities lie. The management will give us a safe working environment and the training we need but if we were to choose to ignore or bypass these protections, we would be out so quickly.... It's not like I work in a dangerous place, I work in an office! The joys of an american company :-)