Health & Safety ....

[Mk2Jo]

How things change ... this is a chap changing a street light in 1910 ... obviously this is not what happens now ... but ... if it was, I think the process would be a lot different lol

 

[Vista]

Indeed it would, there'd be committee meetings about who was qualified to change the bulb, risk assessments on the temperature of the bulb, the height it's at, the most suitable vehicle to use, etc ad infinitum...........and then just as they were about to change the bulb, the unions would argue that in fact it qualifies as a lamp (not a bulb) and therefore man x at a depot 200 miles away is being seen off for a job and the whole lot of them would go out on strike.......

 

 

 

Then by the time they went back to work, the council would argue that it has no budget left for lamp changing and it would have to wait for the next fiscal year........

 

 

 

 

 

Harrumph!

[SmokeEm]

I could tell you a few stories on H&S, let me tell you. In my industry, it's gone from mad to the incredibly insane! That said, we have had a couple of fatalities this year so far

[deltamal]

When I was an apprentice in the 60's I was working with one of the maintenance electricians, we had to replace the fluorescent light tubes in the factory, double extension ladder extended free standing, his foot and arms to steady it, me up the ladder with an 8ft tube! did not enjoy the experience! could have refused but that would have involved humiliation and a slap or two! not a lot of h&s in the 60's.....

[Vista]

In 2002 I was site technical manager for the build of an industrial fridge plant at a new build factory.

 

We had a lot of large bore overhead steel pipelines to install and weld together which we (the company I worked for who'd been sub contracted to do the fridge plant build) had planned and budgeted for lifting each section into place using appropriate certified slinging gear, then welding each joint up from a certified mobile scaffold tower. All these plans had been submitted to the main contractor as part of our bid for the work.

 

On the day of the races, the main contractors H&S guy turned up in our plant room where we were installing all the machinery and pipe work and vetoed the use of the mobile tower insisting instead that we had to fully scaffold out the whole of the plant room. This cost thousands of ££ that we hadn't budgeted for.

 

Surprise surprise, the very day the scaffold was finished and certified the main contractor wanted to work overhead to carry out electrical installation works! Not on my scaffold they weren't. Pay half the bill or Foxtrot Oscar till we're finished work then you can erect your own scaffold!

 

They paid up after a 3 day stand off