Putting in place the new Working at Height Regulations 2005 (WAHR) is vital for any company, manager or self employed person if they want to avoid joining those companies and individuals who have been recently prosecuted by the HSE.
The WAHR regulations came out in 2005 and have since been updated in 2007 to include those who instruct or lead one or more people within leisure, sports or other recreational activities in the UK. The regulations are strictly enforced by the HSE and there have been some successful prosecutions for those found to be in breach of the rules.
This month the latest company, a firm in Leicester, were fined £1,000 and ordered to pay costs totalling £1,870 after an employee injured his heel due to a fall from a crate that was fixed to a fork lift truck. The company failed to plan the work at height and failed to provide the correct equipment.
The HSE advise that the situation is first assessed by a competent person who can then provide the most suitable equipment. In this case, either ladders or a scaffold tower would have been the safer option.
According to the WAHR published by the Health and Safety Executive;
"Ladders can be used for low-risk, short-duration work and where a risk
assessment shows that other more suitable work equipment is not
appropriate because of the location." There are a number of safety
ladders now on the market that comply with all HSE regulations
including:
Scaffold Towers are also useful for one-off jobs, especially with the
various types on the market such as the Mini Folding Scaffold and the
Experto Mobile Scaffold Tower which can be used as a basic piece of
vital kit which, in conjunction with ladders will provide a safe means
of access for most small jobs.
As HSE statistics show that 38 people died in the UK in 2010/11 due to a
fall in the workplace and more than 4,000 other suffered injuries,
shouldn't you have the basic essentials for working at height?
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