IOSH EDINBURGH BRANCH
Minutes of 190 Edinburgh Branch Meeting
Craighouse Campus, Napier University, Edinburgh – Thursday 13 March 2008 - 130pm
Sederunt: D Penman J Brannigan C Lawson C Pender L McCartney R Cooke
R Lovering C McClure A Dick A McGowan M Dunne M Cronston B Ross
S Forbes M D Watson S Wilson T Ambler E Park G MacGregor D Ward
P Ager S Blythe N Holden D Richardson S Keddie G O’Neill R Reed
R Brydon G McGlade D Duff V Stewart M Johnstone L Young G Millar
I Alexander S Hunter B Byrne B Gippert B Anderson D Hamill C Castell
G McGeorge D Sinclair K Lloyd M Bancroft J Davis F Johnston K Breen
A McNeil J R Brownlee N Doherty B Hare P Graham R Weir J Reid
C McGregor M Downer R Brown B Cox P Valente D Fitzsimons R Innes
J Fenton A Reid P Davison J Hepburn J Fisher P Swinson RW Hall
R Bradford C Sheils AA Pittendreigh H Pearson B Owtram S Campbell
Apologies: Andrew Sharman, Anne James, Graeme Russell, D Cawkwell, Tony Sayers, Ann Diment, Graeme Lyall, Ruth Turner, Les Roberts.
1 Chair: Liz Young took the Chair.
2. Minutes of previous meeting: February 2008
· Receipt – anyone not in receipt please email Secretary.
· Accuracy: Proposer – Clive Castell ; Seconder – Denise Fitzsimons.
· Matters arising – none not on agenda.
3 Correspondence:
· McLure Naismith FREE SEMINAR: Psychiatric Evidence in Court : Thur 13 March 2008 Edinburgh Office: 5.00pm. Dr Tim Rogers, Consultant Psychiatrist.The use of psychiatric evidence in litigation.
· Friday 25 April 2008: Global Conference: Occupational and Environmental Cancer Prevention: University of Stirling
4. Group Reports
Forth and Tay District: The meeting recorded its thanks to Dick Mann who had retired as Secretary of the District.
Fire Risk Management: Paul Graham had got copies available of the standardised Fire Risk assessments from Scottish Healthy Working Lives.
Public Services: Marion Johnstone reported that the group hoped to launch the elected members guidance booklet at the NSS in September.
5. Members Items
· IOSH IPD Drop-in Session: Wed 26 March.
· Branch Day Seminar: Advanced Report Writing:14 April: Risk Factory: Sold Out
· Site Visits: June: Cockenzie Power Station (date tba)
· Plus another in October (exact venue to be arranged)
· AGM is in May – nomination forms available and downloadable from website.
6. Guest Speakers:
Stewart Campbell – HSE Director Scotland
40 years of Health & Safety
Branch Executive member Julian Davies introduced Stewart Campbell to the members by indicating that he had been the Director of HSE Scotland since 2001hahving been an HSE Inspector for 30 years and had worked in several area, but he had certainly made a mark and been the leading light for safety in Scotland.
Stewart then stated he was he was grateful for the opportunity to return to IOSH Edinburgh Branch and was also grateful that the Branch had gained Judith Hackett of HSC coming to speak to the members two months ago, as it had given him a wonderful chance of putting her into the picture on lots of elements which he would perhaps not have the chance to do if she had not been in Edinburgh at that time.
Health and Safety in 1973
Stewart then indicated that perhaps he and another “old git” in the room in the form of Russell Brownlie were perhaps the only individuals in the room that might remember the conditions back in 1973 and whilst it must be considered a last resort to refer back to the Factory Inspectors report of 1973 it had provided some of the information he was about to present.
• Between Robens and HSW Act; - 1973 saw the enforcement agency changing from the Factory Inspectorate which had been in existence for 150 years
• Separate inspectorates, separate laws; - There had at that time been many separate inspectorates covering various trades and activities = Rail, Factories, Off shore etc. The introduction of the HASAWA changed the prosecution system here in Scotland as up until then the HSE had undertaken their own prosecutions in the Sherriff Courts rather than the Procurator Fiscal and Stewart’s own claim to fame was being the last Factory Inspector in Scotland to prosecute in Scotland – it was of British Rail, for having a dirty signal box at Fort William and he had to follow the prosecution of two pouchers.
• Fatal accidents; the level in 1973 were 293 fatal accidents in Factories & 231 in Construction so it is good to see the reduction to the current levels
• North Sea oil; manufacturing industry & ship building industry were working towards new areas by building oil rigs some 400ft to 600ft high
• Asbestos in use; despite the basic knowledge of the problems with asbestos there was still wide mining and use of asbestos in the construction industry
• Bars on windows; This was one of the priorities which were being pushed in 1973, probably because of the fire in James Watt St where 20 people died because of bars on the windows preventing their escape so it was at that time “bars on windows” were envisaged as a real risk and we have always needed to prioritise the use of resources.
• Hours of work. The Factory Inspectorate were required to apply exemption orders for hours of work for young persons and female workers.
The speaker indicated that from a period he had spent on the continent it appears that the French are still using a Labour Inspectorate similar to the old Factory Inspectorate and he added that perhaps now was the time for HSE and IOSH to look wider at ALL conditions of work – including hours of work, rates of pay, etc
What has changed?
• More integrated HSE (but still not fully integrated) and there is an obvious concentration on health and safety;
• Some safety priorities; however there have been changes in the form of employement with a move away from the original manufacturing
• Some health priorities; Lead poisoning was a lot higher in 1973 than now, but there has also been a shift in what is accepted a health issues, with the inclusion now of stress, musculoskeletal injuries, etc.
• Fatal accidents; the levels now are a lot lower with the rate dropping from nominally 4.7 in the 1970’s to nominally 0.7 now
• HSW Act Section 3; The speaker indicated that he had not foreseen the big impact that was possible from section 3 and the way that it would be pushed into other areas where we would see “conkers” being banned under safety legislation
• Safety cases/charging regimes; now a very large part of the H&S landscape where Safety Cases are considered for the hazardous operations of off-shore working and railways etc added to which is the issue of HSE charging for their input.
• Development of health and safety profession; again an area where he did not foresee the level or extent this would change – even IOSH developing from what was then ISO
• Work patterns; the changes from full to part-time and job sharing, the move to service industries, the use of migrant workers and the change in the occupations available to women
• Work is good for you. Seen within th context of public health
What hasn’t changed?
• Enforcing Authority Regulations ; undertaken by HSE & Las following a lot of unchanged regulations, but it was felt that the “nettle” had not been fully grasped as yet
• HSC/E structure (until now); however as the members will be aware from Judith Hackett’s talk, this is going to change in June of 2008
• Gravity; we still kill people at too great a rate from fall from hieght
• Dust and fumes; still makes people ill
• Human nature; On one of the speakers formative visits to Germany he noted that in a margarine packing Company the machines had signs telling the workers not put their hands inside the machine – but no guards. Talking later to the Chief Executive he was told the current labour was not as good as the older ones because the workers don’t comply with the signs.
• Commitment.
A reserved function in a devolved context
• HSE and LAs;The new Government may consider devolving H&S to the Scottish Parliament – it has been an unending conversation over past years.
• Health and safety -v- Public Health; a good working relationship has been developed with health authorities & the NHS etc, but there is still a need to develop this still further in scotland
• Health and safety -v- Enterprise; So far there has been little success in Scotland apart from under Highland Enterprise
• HSE and Justice; there are difficulties in Scotland due to the differences in the legal system, but there is a good working relationship with the Procurator Fiscals office
• PHASS and SCHWL;
• Regulatory reform. There is s future regulatory budget where defined budgets must be met and this could lead to some regulations being repealed in order to pay for new regulations
A new HSE and a revised strategy
• New HSE from June onwards;
• Stronger corporate governance and commitment;
• Likely to be a revised strategy; to take us up to 2010 – the new executive will launch a new one possibly with IOSH input
• Need for IOSH and others to contribute;
• More stakeholder involvement in policy making.
The speaker than asked the members where they thought we may be by 2013 – 5 years from now
And gained comments on –
How effective the new legislation on Corporate Manslaughter might be seen to be
Changes in regulations which may affect small businesses
A greater number of Inspectors – The speaker indicated that he was aware that some 50 more Inspectors are currently to be recruited (4 or 5 may be in Scotland). This may enable an improvement in the ratio of pro-active: reactive actions from the current 45:55 towards the ideal and stated level of 60:40 which HSE are supposed to be working at.
The speaker then revealed his final slide of where he had considered we may be in 2013 entitled
How do you make God laugh?
His thoughts were based around -
• Politics & in particular Scotland? – Will we be devolved? Will there be a change in government? All of these will have a major effect on where we are at in 2013
• Olympics? – They will have a big effect on the SE of England which is likely to have some variations to us in Scotland from the construction industry
• Disaster effect on policy and priorities? – We can’t say what disaster may befall us in the meantime, but just imagine the changes which may follow such an event as a major crane falling over a busy motorway.
• Better regulation? Hopefully more pointed
• Corporate Manslaughter and Culpable Homicide Act — impact? – No one can say how effective the legislation may or may not be and at this point it is not realised jusy how widespread the effect it might have on Roads, Hospitals, Public health, etc.
• Integrated approach to health? – This is a personal hope of the speaker.
• Decent work? – Perhaps we will not see Call centres with excessive hours, Fruit picking, etc – all of the occupations and porr conditions which have replaced the old sweat shops etc
• International use of asbestos? – the speaker indicated he would like to think it could become an International Crime to mine it or use it
The speaker was then presented with an engraved quaich from the Edinburgh Branch in recognition of his input to H&S in Scotland over the past years.
Following a short break -
Dr Billy Hare – Glasgow Caledonian University
Overview of recent & current research
Billy was introduced to the members by Executive Member Paul Graham, who indicated that he was one of the individuals who had been working on the IOSH funded Research Project at Caledonian University looking into Superior Safety Performance. The speaker then gave a little more insight into his background having firstly indicated that in listening to the previous speaker talking of the H&S events over the past years, said there was only one thing he could add of note – 1973 was when he was born.
Previous & current research
The speaker indicted by use of the Triple Ace Triangle forwarded by Ian Waldram a past President of IOSH as being the areas of concern – Where the three sides of the triangle represent
– Management Commitment to OSH/Leadership
– Competent OSH Advice;
– OSH Worker engagement
The first of these elements had been addressed by HSE Integration of H&S Planning (RR263)
CII Safety Leadership (B Maloney, USA, 2008)
The second had been addressed by the IOSH funded research - IOSH ‘Superior Safety Performance’ which the speaker intended to give just a brief overview of
The third element being - HSE Worker Engagement RR516 EPSRC Employee information sharing and Engaging migrant workers, which he wanted to spend the majority of time on
Superior Safety Performance
This particular research had been funded by IOSH Research & Development funding and had been aimed at defining -
• Is there a relationship between “competent advice” and Safety Performance?
• What factors influence ability of OSH professional
• Other related (organisational) factors
The original research had hoped to consider both health & safety performance but it was considered too difficult to measure and adjustments had to be made looking specifically at safety performance.
Briefly the findings were as follows:-
Cost benefit relationship
Comparing the investment in safety , which was taken as nominal salary indicators based on an indicative qualification, against turnover levels and accident costs.
The findings indicated that investment in safety needed to be at approximately 0.1% of turnover for the best returns (beyond this there was an indication of diminishing returns)
Organisational factors:
OSH Personnel - OSH Professionals Internal or External
Again there was found to be a variation of benefits from the choice of internal or external OSH Professionals.
Only Internal OSH Personnel Mean AFR: 1274 Only OSH Consultants (Ext.) Mean AFR: 3168
Mixed Internal/External Mean ARF: 1623
(Turnover < £25m) (Turnover < £25m)
Only Internal OSH Personnel Mean AFR: 2127 Only OSH Consultants (Ext.) Mean AFR: 3591
Mixed Internal/External Mean ARF: 1905
The internal staff showed greater benefits over the external consultants in terms of accident performance, which led the speaker to indicated that the use of consultants were a good supplement but were not a replacement. However having said that he also stated that he appreciated that the size of the Company would be a major factor in making the choice of internal or external resource. If you considered the previous cost benefits once the company had attained a turnover of £30m the 0.1% factor a salary of £30,000 became a realistic option for an internal professional
Organisational factors:
Line Mgt.
The returns on the level of management training in OSH was also a factor
Where the level of Line Management training was below Industry standard of 2 days the AFR was typically 1825, but if the line management had undertaken SMSTS/MS training of 2 days the AFR dropped to 1567 and where the level of training was above H&S NVQ3 the AFR dropped still further to 211
Other issues discussed in the report
• Membership of OSH professional bodies
• OSH Function:
– Do they train other staff?
– Do they vet sub-contractors?
– Do they have other responsibilities?
– What level of authority?
• Other organisational factors:
– Performance rewards
– Client’s influence
– SMS
– Behavioural safety scheme
The speaker then indicated that if the members wished to gain a greater insight into the report they should perhaps refer to the IOSH web site for a full summary or alternatively purchase a copy of the full report. http://www.iosh.co.uk/files/funds/researchsummaries.pdf
The speaker then turned to the current research which unfortunately IOSH have not funded but is instead being funded by the Construction Industry.
Migrant construction workers
Current problems - frequently based around gangers/ interpreters and translators
- Existing methods limited, where site inductions are completed if the individuals have low levels of understanding English
- Lack of understanding, where the translators do not understand technical terms etc
Pictorial methods - is used elsewhere but there is no obvious convention
– HSA, HSE-NI, In-house, Safety Signs Regs
– Ad hoc, no obvious convention, ‘cartoon’ style
English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL)
– Vocational English (construction)
– Limited H&S (unstructured, ad-hoc)
Current industry guidance/resources
Currently available literature includes –
HSE
• Translated leaflets http://www.hse.gov.uk/languages/
• Interpreter 0845 345 0055
• Employing workers from overseas (food ind.) http://www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/indg414.pdf
• Research Report 502 http://www.hse.gov.uk/research/rrhtm/rr502.htm
Construction Confederation/Scottish Building Federation
• Managing H&S of non-English speaking personnel in construction
TUC guidance
• http://www.tuc.org.uk/extras/safetymw.pdf
Engineering Construction Industry Association (ECIA)
• Working with foreign contractors in the UK and managing the H&S of foreign or non-English speaking employees (£60)
ECIA Guidance
In assessing the risks there are three areas to consider –
– Language skills (which is what this research is aimed at)
– Training & Competence – Government organizations are providing a cross reference to overseas qualifications
– Level of Supervision – As yet there is no direct indication of suggested level of supervision
HSA SSWP Pictograms
The speaker showed examples taken from a booklet down load at –
http://publications.hsa.ie/index.asp?locID=27&docID=-1
And also from an HSE NI Universal Safety Book
http://www.hseni.gov.uk/hseni_universal_safety_booklet_migrant_workers.pdf
This research is being funded to the tune of £76,000 over 6 months to cover
• Develop communication aids
• Develop guidance for GE700 / SMSTS
• Develop English/Pictorial questions for communication & CSCS test
Methods
Deliver Lexicon
They are hoping to deliver a Lexicon based around a common language from the areas understood in both OSHP Professional Vocabulary & the Construction Worker Vocabulary
• Content analysis of ‘worker’ training materials
• Example:
– CITB Tool-Box-Talks
– HSE/HSA ‘worker’ guides
– Contractor in-house training
• Pictures extracted for separate analysis
• Identify critical words/phrases
• Classify (structured thesaurus)
• Convert to ‘plain English’
Deliver pictorial inventory
• Annotate/Label H&S images
• Example:
– Scandinavian ‘silent book’
– HSA pictograms
– Safety signs
• Map to H&S lexicon
• Test images for recognition
– English 2nd Language
The speaker then demonstrated a possible active system which utilised sound as well as the pictorgrams to demonstrate actual effective communications.
Benefits
Business
• Aid discharging legal duties
• Improve current communication strategies:
– Training
– Induction
– Site rules
– Emergency procedures
• Improved meaningful worker engagement
Workers: direct
• Understand site hazards/risks
• Understand site rules/controls
• Understand what to do in an emergency procedures
Workers: indirect
• Introduction to H&S words/phrases in English
• Aid integration
• Worker gains from involvement
Summary
The speaker then made a request for Industry input:
Validation – is this useful?
Could it be improved?
Collaboration – what do you do?
Can you provide access to
Polish; Russian; Romanian workers?
National coverage.
Expressions of interest: b.hare@gcal.ac.uk 0141 331 3908
7. Closing details
Dates of next meeting:
· Forth & Tay District: 3 April: Sandy Fowler, District Committee Member: CDM
· Edinburgh Branch: 10 April: Corporate Manslaughter: Elena Fry: Biggart Baillie
Max Bancroft, MRSC, CMIOSH
Branch Secretary
Richard Lovering, CFIOSH
Branch Executive