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Questions and Answers

Here we have highlighted a few questions and answers related to Health and Safety in the workplace. Please do contact us if you have any questions that you’d like us to answer and we’ll add them anonymously to this page as well as letting you know directly what the answer is.

Q What are the regulations on the use of safety helmets?

Q My employer wants me to work in a confined space — do I have to?

Q Do our office cleaners have to adhere to any health and safety rulings?

Q How can I tell if water is safe to drink in our company?

Q Who is responsible for the maintenance of equipment from a plant hire company?

Q Should I be given training in manual handling?

Q What are the regulations concerning asbestos in the workplace?

Q What risks need to be considered when working on the roof of a building?

Q Are there any special risks to be aware of when using a mobile work platform?

Q It gets very hot in our office during the summer - is there a legal maximum temperature?

Q What are the regulations on the use of safety helmets?

There are two sets of regulations that apply, depending on the nature of work being undertaken - however, both sets of regulations rely on assessing the risk of head injury in deciding whether head protection is needed. For example, all the following would require the provision on head protection under either set of regulations:

Building work near scaffolding and elevated workplaces
Work in pits, trenches, or shafts
Tree-felling
Metal forging and steelworks
Work near lifting equipment (e.g. hoists)

When it’s decided that head protection is needed, it’s necessary that the equipment fits the wearer after adjustment, it provides protection from foreseeable risk of injury to the head, and that it’s suitable for the type of work being carried out.

There are however, exceptions to the rule — for example, a follower of the Sikh religion is legally exempt from wearing a safety helmet while on a construction site, providing that he is wearing a turban.

A seemingly simple subject as safety helmets has a great deal more depth than covered here so please do contact us for more information about the regulations.

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Q My employer wants me to work in a confined space — do I have to?

Employers are obliged to first try to avoid the need for workers to go into confined spaces, but if that’s not possible then they must:

Draw up a safe system of work by carrying out a risk assessment
Restrict entry to any confined space to only employees who are competent in working within confined spaces and have received suitable training
Verify that the atmosphere in the confined space is safe to breathe
Provide any necessary ventilation
Ensure that effective rescue arrangements are in place before anyone enters a confined space.

The subject of working in confined spaces has a great deal more depth than covered here so please do contact us for more information about the regulations.

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Q Do our office cleaners have to adhere to any health and safety rulings?

Official rules state that ‘cleaning should be carried out by an effective and suitable method and without creating or exposing anyone to a health or safety risk’. What this means is that the cleaners, their staff, and clients staff can face various hazards from cleaning work. These include:

Lifting and handling of cleaning equipment
Slips and falls
Exposure to hazardous substances and chemicals
Lone working issues
Fire risks from poor waste storage

The client has specific responsibilities relating to the cleaning contract that could affect both the cleaning staff and the client’s own staff. Just one example of this is the question: “What accident and first aid provisions are to be made for cleaners?”

Equally, the cleaning contractor also has specific responsibilities to ensure that their own staff and the clients staff are protected. An example of this is the need to ensure adequate warning is provided of spillages and leaks so that accidents don’t occur.

Arranging for the cleaning of company premises may on the surface seem like a simple procedure but the obligations of both the cleaning contractor and the client can get extremely detailed. Please do contact us for more information about areas you need to consider.

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Q How can I tell if water is safe to drink in our company?

Under the Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations 1992, cold water supplies should be marked if there is a danger from drinking.

Water safety is a subject that has a great deal more depth than covered here so please do contact us for more information about the regulations.

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Q Who is responsible for the maintenance of equipment from a plant hire company?

Under the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998 (PUWER), employers are required to ensure that work equipment is maintained in an efficient state and working order. These regulations are also extended to ‘a person who has control, to any extent, of work equipment’, which means that the plant hire company is also responsible even though they don’t control the use of the equipment on the clients premises.

The guidance suggests that although the client will have their own duties in respect of the safe use of the equipment, the hiring company will often take the lead in inspecting and maintaining the equipment because it’s the hiring company that take responsibility for the maintenance schedules and availability of the equipment they supply.

What’s important though is that both the hire company and the client are clear about their respective responsibilities and that these are clearly set out in writing.

For further help with drawing up agreements between your company and a hire company, please do contact us.

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Q Should I be given training in manual handling?

Although there’s no strict legal duty under the Manual Handling Operations Regulations 1992 to carry out manual handling training, there is a need under other regulations for companies to provide the necessary information and training to ensure safe manual handling.

As is the case with many regulations, it can sometimes be unclear when training is and isn’t required so please do contact us for more information about whether your company needs to consider manual handling training.

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Q What are the regulations concerning asbestos in the workplace?

Under the Control of Asbestos at Work Regulations 2002, the owners, occupiers, and those with responsibility for non-domestic premises will have a legal duty to manage the risk, or co-operate with the risk manager of, asbestos.
The regulations require those in charge of ‘non-domestic premises to:

Carry out suitable risk assessments to identify the location and condition of any materials containing asbestos, and identify the type of asbestos present.
Create and maintain records of the location and state of asbestos on the premises
Assess if anyone is being, or likely to be, exposed to asbestos fibres
Provide information to anyone who is likely to work on or disturb any asbestos-containing materials
Take steps to ensure that asbestos management measures are put into practice, monitored, and recorded.

Asbestos in the workplace is a subject that has a great deal more depth than covered here so please do contact us for more information about the regulations.

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Q What risks need to be considered when working on the roof of a building?

The biggest risk from roof working is that of falls so there should be secure fencing provided in areas where a person may fall more than two metres, or where a fall of less than two metres carries higher risk, e.g. if falling onto a traffic route. As a minimum there should be two strong guardrails, at least 1100 millimetres above the surface from where the worker could fall.

In some instances additional precautions are required, such as the use of a safety harness linked to a fall arrest system, which will stop the worker falling beneath the guardrails.

There are many issues to consider with roof working and, unfortunately, many horror stories too, so for the best advice about safe roof working, please contact us.

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Q Are there any special risks to be aware of when using a mobile work platform?

If using a mobile work platform, you need to be aware of many of the common dangers such as the following examples:

Tools, materials, or people falling from the mobile work platform
Contact with overhead hazards, such as electric cables
People becoming trapped between the platform and other fixed objects
Awareness of the dangers associated with moving the platform over uneven ground, or in windy conditions
Potential of the accidental operation of controls
Possibility of people becoming stranded on the platform due to power failure

The subject of working on a mobile work platform has a great deal more depth than covered here so please do contact us for more information about the regulations.

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Q It gets very hot in our office during the summer - is there a legal maximum temperature?

Although there is no legal maximum temperature for indoor workplaces, employers should still take reasonable steps to achieve a comfortable workplace. Such steps could include:

Provision of increased ventilation, e.g. fans, or opening windows
Positioning workplaces away from direct heat sources, such as windows
Installing window blinds/solar reflective glass, to reduce the amount of direct sunlight

Employers should also expect to provide sufficient thermometers so that people can determine the temperature in the workplace.

The subject of workplace temperature has a great deal more depth than covered here so please do contact us for more information about the regulations.

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