UK Health & Safety News Roundup – October 2018

Health and safety is a serious issue

As health and safety consultants and experts in our field, it’s essential that we remain up to date with what’s happening in the market. Laws and regulations change. Best practices are continually evolving.

Our monthly Health and Safety News Roundup is our pick of the news items and articles that we’ve read over the past month. We hope you find this month’s selection as informative and thought-provoking as we do.

This month’s news highlights how well the UK industry is doing with health and safety, while also showing how much further we have to travel to what must be the ultimate goal: zero injuries and deaths in the workplace. Striking news includes:

• Stories that highlight the need to guard machinery and ensure that your workers heed the health and safety guide for operating and working on machinery with moving parts. Serious breaches led to horrific injuries to workers and fines of £500,000 and £40,000 respectively to Pirelli in Carlisle and Timberline DIY in Jarrow.
• Good nuclear health and safety performances at Sellafield were honoured by the RoSPA. Meanwhile, the Atomic Weapons Establishment was prosecuted after it admitted safety breaches which led to a workplace injury.
• A bedding company was fined £30,000 for its tired health and safety policy which relied on ‘common sense’.
• A garden centre was heavily fined after a member of staff was hurt while using hazardous chemicals to clean up. (They clearly did not read our article “10,300 reasons you must carry out a risk assessment if your employees use chemicals”.)
• Good news as the UK’s number of fatalities at work is one of the lowest in the EU. However, with a total 144 workplace deaths caused by accidents, there is still much work to be done to get the number to zero. Once more, the construction and agriculture industries suffered the highest number of fatalities in 2017/18.
• Finally, a blog with some great tips to improve the health and wellbeing of office workers. Useful advice to protect muscular and eye injury (and perfect to read in conjunction with our post detailing how to protect against ergonomic hazards in the workplace.)

Plenty to get your health and safety juices flowing, whatever industry you work in. Click on the headlines to reveal the full article.

·Pirelli factory in Carlisle fined £500000 for serious health and safety …

Pirelli tyres has been fined almost £520,000 after two workers were pulled into inadequately guarded machinery and suffered horrific arm injuries. The first …

·Bedding company whose health and safety policy was ‘use common …

When a council officer asked the bedding firm’s boss what health and safety training staff had received he revealed he just told them to use common sense.

·UK government releases document on chemical regulation in case of …

Defra said that the UK would preserve the REACH legislation as far as possible in the event of no deal and that the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) would act …

·Garden centre fined £100000 following hazardous chemical incident

Perrywood Garden Centre and Nurseries Ltd admitted to three safety offences under the Health and Safety at Work Act, when a member of staff developed …

·Fingers chopped cleaning saw land firm with £40k fine

An investigation by the Health and Safety Executive found the machine was not effectively braked and the blade took an excessive amount of time to stop.

·Safety fear Dumfries school has 1200 ‘issues’

It added that independent investigations of the site had found “high and medium priority items” which would present “operational health and safety risks”. It said it …

·Annual Statistics for Fatal Workplace Injuries – The findings and what …

The Health & Safety Executive (HSE) has released annual statistics reporting on fatal … The good news is the UK as a whole is one of the lowest rates of fatal …

·AWE bosses admit health and safety breaches

Bosses at Aldermaston’s Atomic Weapons Establishment have admitted safetyfailings that led to a man getting burnt. A prosecution hearing was held at …

·Nuclear companies honoured for safety at Sellafield

A range of companies have received multiple RoSPA Health and Safety Awards, … Beatty Kilpatrick, Hertel UK Ltd, National Nuclear Laboratory, PPS Electrical, …

·Worker trapped in rotating drum during terrifying accident in Rotherham

The skip hire and waste processing company has now been fined £30,000, and ordered to pay £3,621 costs, after it admitted breaching health and safety …

·How to stay fit and healthy at work

While there are fewer health and safety risks associated with this working environment than … Access more career related resources on cabacareers.org.uk.

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