Contents:

• Why we are different!
• New standard announced
• Corrective and preventive action

• Directors' responsibilities (1)
• Directors' responsibilities (2)
• Employees' responsibilities
• Corporate manslaughter
• HSE warning about segregating public access on construction sites.
• Safe operation of plant

Reminder: To contact Andy Saunders, please use the Ipswich office number 01473 726427..

Alternatively, you can continue to use our main office number which is 01449 675521. This is also the number for Chris Hamilton.

When we established QES Connect Ltd just over seven years ago, our aim was to provide the sort of service that a full time safety advisor or quality manager would provide in a large company to small to medium sized businesses that could not afford to have a full-time specialist. Having fulfilled these roles in a large company, we felt we had the ability to deliver these services in the small business environment. This has remained our aim, and because we are still here, it seems we have been delivering what our customers want. We provide the sort of "hands-on" approach that you would expect from the person on your payroll. This means that we will carry out practical work such as risk assessments, COSHH assessments, audits and reviews on your behalf.

There are many consultants offering health and safety and quality advice, and we see some of their output when we visit potential clients. In some cases, it appears that their approach is to write a large manual, setting out what the client should be doing, but not to help the client to do it.

Many of these safety manuals restate guidance available in Health & Safety Executive (HSE) publications, so do not add value. Similarly, the quality manuals often restate the requirements of ISO9001.

Paperwork, in itself, has never prevented an accident or stopped a customer being dissatisfied. We wrote about what procedures are required (or not required) for a quality management system in our May 2007 news letter. Our approach is to provide documentation that is required (by law or by a standard) and is relevant to the client. For a health and safety management system, this will include a health and safety policy, and documented risk assessments. For a quality manual it will be procedures that relate to the customer's own business management systems.

The difference that we believe that we offer is practical assistance to deal with reducing the risk of problems occurring. In some cases, only the client company management can take the actions required, but if we can help by carrying out an action such as carrying out noise survey or COSHH assessment, assessing suitable PPE, or producing guidance notes or checklists for staff, we will do so. This is what you would expect of an in-house adviser, and this is the service we provide to our clients which we think makes us different from some other consultants.

If you do not currently use QES Connect for quality or safety management, and you need practical help, please get in touch.

BSI has published BS25999-2:2007, a new standard for business continuity management. Before you skip to the next item, you might want to consider what happened to businesses near the Buncefield oil depot fire, or in the flood-hit areas of Gloucestershire last summer. Events beyond their control affected their ability to serve their customers. Without any plans to respond to emergencies, their businesses came to a stop, and if their customers went elsewhere, many of the businesses would never recover. This is where business continuity management (BCM) systems come into play. Business continuity management is about identifying risks, and planning what action is needed to mitigate their effects. Like ISO9001 quality management systems, BCM systems are built around the Plan-Do-Check-Act cycle, so the auditing and testing of emergency response plans forms part of the cycle.

The new standard published by BSI is the basis for external certification of such systems in the same way and by the same companies that assess to ISO9001. It is likely that customers who want to be assured of continued supply will start to ask about BCM and demand evidence of effective systems in the same way that they have for quality, with management systems certified to ISO9001. We are therefore suggesting that you might want to think about this topic, and develop your own BCM system, before your customers make it a condition of doing business with you.

If you would like advice on BCM, contact QES Connect.

Continuing our occasional series of articles on the requirements of ISO9001, we turn to corrective and preventive action. These are areas that are frequently misunderstood (even by quality professionals), so a few words of explanation may not go amiss. Corrective action is defined as action to prevent the recurrence of an unwanted event, and preventive action is action to prevent the unwanted event occurring in the first place.

Some people confuse corrective action with remedial action. For example, if a customer complains that something has been done wrongly, and you then fix the problem, this is remedial action, not corrective action. Corrective action requires an understanding of why the error occurred, which means analysing the root cause. This analysis may need to go through several levels of causes (likened to peeling back the skins on an onion), but once the root cause has been found, then corrective action can be taken to prevent it recurring. This is not to say that you have to do this for every problem, but the more you do, the better the solutions will be.

One anecdote explaining how not to do it involves a mistake made by a temporary member of staff. The manager's response to "corrective action" was that the miscreant had left the company, so the problem had gone away and would not recur. In fact the problem related to lack of training of the temporary staff member, so the problem could recur if another temp was taken on. True corrective action would have been to improve the training for all temporary staff.

Preventive action requires even more thought, because it involves events that have not yet occurred. Preventive action takes place during the planning of a service, or design of a product. The thought process has to include the "what if" scenarios. In product design, this can include formal approaches such a FMEA (failure modes and effect analysis). It is equivalent to the risk assessment process in health and safety. Preventive action means thinking about how errors might occur, then taking steps to prevent them. The actions should be proportionate to the likely effects. Examples of preventive action include designing the product so that it cannot be wrongly assembled. Clearly, actions that rely on people to remember to do something correctly are less robust than actions that cannot be done wrongly, so process and product design is important. Preventive action does not just occur at the initial stages of a process or product design, but at reviews throughout its life. Experience of problems that have not yet affected the customer, but have been spotted in-house, will give opportunities for preventive action. The forum for discussing these actions may be management meetings or team meetings, but ISO9001 requires that actions taken should be recorded, and then they should be reviewed for effectiveness.

If corrective and preventive actions are mysteries to you, or you need help with getting to the root of problems, contact QES Connect.

A recent ruling by the Court of Appeal on the criminal liability of directors has clarified the responsibility of directors in relation to health and safety. The Court of Appeal ruling clarified that it is not just what the director knows, but also what he should know, that is important. Under section 37 of the Health & Safety at Work Act, a director, manager, company secretary or similar official in a position of real power to decide company policy or strategy can be prosecuted if, among other things, the offence of failing to protect people's safety was attributable to their neglect. The new ruling makes it clear that directors and others in controlling positions need to ensure that they are aware of what is going on in their organisation, as ignorance is no longer a defence. The use of effective monitoring and reporting processes, covering not just events that have occurred, but also risks that have been identified, is clearly a significant step here.

A recent research study by HSE has looked at how the powers for disqualification orders under the Company Directors Disqualification Act 1986 were used in relation to health and safety failures in the management of companies. The report concluded that there was a low awareness among HSE managers and local authorities of the powers available to courts to disqualify directors, and that there was currently no strategy to use disqualification as a sanction.

The report suggests that a policy on the use to be made of the 1986 Act should be formulated at a senior policy-making level within HSE. Clearly, if this recommendation is adopted, directors will have not consider not only their wallets but also their ability to continue to act as directors for companies other than the one where the offence has occurred.

If you are a director who is unclear about his responsibilities for health and safety, we can provide training and assistance. Contact QES Connect.

Following on from the item above, it is fair to point out that the Health & Safety at Work etc Act 1974 applies to employees as well as to directors. A recent prosecution of two employees of Balfour Beatty Power Networks illustrates this point. The incident involved an unguarded excavation, into which a 90-year old man fell, receiving injuries from which he subsequently died.

The employees were convicted of breaching section 7(a) of the Health and Safety at Work Act which states: " It shall be the duty of every employee while at work to take reasonable care for the health and safety of himself and of other persons who may be affected by his acts or omissions at work." The two defendants were fined and ordered to pay costs.

HSE Inspector Nicola Allbut said after the case: "This was a tragic accident which was completely preventable. I am satisfied that the defendants had received appropriate training and had access to barriers to erect around the excavation. They chose not to use these barriers, walking away and leaving the excavation unguarded. As a result, this elderly gentleman lost his life."

Do your employees understand their responsibilities? Have you communicated to them the control measures you have identified in your risk assessment? If you need help with safety, contact QES Connect.

Do your employees understand their responsibilities? Have you communicated to them the control measures you have identified in your risk assessment? If you need help with safety, contact QES Connect.

In our last newsletter, we summarised the Corporate Manslaughter and Homicide Act which will come into force in April this year. The Sentencing Advisory Panel has now set out its proposals for sentences to be imposed under the Act. As well as publicity orders which will compel convicted companies to publicise details of the offence and the conviction, the Panel is proposing fines starting at 5% of average annual turnover for the 3 years preceding sentencing for a "non guilty" plea. The court will then take into account any aggravating and/or mitigating circumstances, arriving at a fine which will normally fall within a range of 2.5 to 10% of average annual turnover.

This is higher than the fines suggested for a breach of the Health & Safety at Work etc Act 1974 involving death, where the starting point is 2.5% of average annual turnover, and fines normally fall within the range of 1% to 7.5% of average annual turnover.

Company directors need to be aware of their responsibilities for health and safety, and to ensure that their company is adequately protected. Ask QES Connect Ltd for advice on minimising the risks to your business.

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has warned of the dangers of not segregating the public from construction sites. The warning follows the death of a man who was killed by a collapsing wall after an excavator had struck it.

Anthony Broderick, a self employed property developer of Old Hall Street, Sale, Greater Manchester was fined £17,500 and ordered to pay £9,500 costs at Trafford Magistrates Court for breaches of the Health & Safety at work Act.

The prosecution, brought by HSE, followed the death of John Jones on 3 March 2005. Mr Jones stepped out of his home into an alleyway when the bucket of an excavator, driven by Anthony Broderick, unintentionally hit a wall that collapsed onto Mr Jones and killed him.

The court heard that Mr Broderick, who owned the block of properties, was demolishing the 1.8 metre wall, at the time removing a gate in order to construct car parking spaces.

HSE Principal Inspector Anna Bliss said:

"This tragic accident could very easily have been avoided had Mr Broderick taken time to fence off the footpath and make arrangements for access to the flats at safe times only.

"For the construction industry Mr Broderick was doing a relatively simple job - just demolishing a wall. However, he was working alone, using powerful machinery without taking simple precautions for the safety of others. Smaller contractors should always set up the basic site safety measures before they begin work. HSE publishes guidance on what should be done, including free leaflets."

"Construction activities that create risk outside of an existing site perimeter must be managed to ensure that members of the public are safe during the work. For short term work a banksman may be sufficient to ensure works stops as people pass. For high-risk activities or where the work takes place over a longer period of time, the site perimeter should be temporarily extended a safe distance, with clear fencing and warning signs."

"Alternative pedestrian or traffic routes may need to be arranged and may need permission from the local authority. Fuller guidance on ensuring the safety of the public from construction work can be found in HSE's publication 'Protecting the Public - your next move'."

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has warned of the need to ensure that the operators of equipment are suitably trained and risks fully assessed before they start work, following HSE's prosecution of Stockport Metropolitan Borough Council after a dumper truck driver was injured when his truck overturned and landed on top of him.

The Court heard that the accident happened in 2006 when dumper truck driver suffered leg injuries after his vehicle overturned while carrying out landscaping work in Hollywood Park, Stockport.

HSE Inspector Helen Fuller said:

"Anyone involved with workplace transport should be aware of the operational limitations associated with the use of plant and should not underestimate the risks of improper equipment use. Employers have a duty of care to ensure that drivers are suitably trained; risks are assessed when planning work; and that adequate safety measures are in place.

"This prosecution should serve as a salutary lesson to those concerned with the operation of site dumpers and other workplace transport and act as a warning to prevent further accidents."

Produced by QES Connect Ltd. Except where stated, the material included in the newsletter is taken from freely available public sources. It may be reproduced without permission for non-commercial purposes.