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Has Health & Safety gone mad......again?

Mark Stephens from F10 www.f10.co.uk

interview with Charles James from Blusteel Solutions

 

We take a look at the automated technology supporting the H&S arena and investigate why companies are still hesitant to invest into them?

 

With the advent of the revised laws for corporate manslaughter, most business managers and owners have at least raised an eyebrow and cast a look in the direction of this topic.

We decided it was worth taking a look, to see what impact it has had and what companies can or are doing about it.

I met up with Charles James, a leading, independent consultant in compliance and audit software, specializing in the ‘need for automation' and ‘Electronic Software' for the H&S environment. I was very surprised with what he had to tell me.

Many companies have generally been slow to embrace technology and the majority of small to medium sized business's are still operating paper based systems that are comparable (in comparison to the latest technology), to working in the Ice Age.

So I wanted to find out why there was a resistance to investment in this area and what risk companies were putting themselves in.

 

MS - Charles, tell us a little bit about your background and how you ended up working in this area:

CJ - I have spent the last 14 years working in the software license, audit and compliance arena working for two global multi-billion dollar orginisations in the US and across Europe working with Microsoft, Oracle, Adobe and Symantec. About 18 months ago I was asked to look at compliance in the facilities management arena and was surprised to see how large councils and housing associations and private landlords were using antiquated methods to manage their estates when it came to managing sites, stock, people and H&S. When I drilled down a bit more as to how Facilities Managers and health and safety managers managed health and safety I was taken aback that almost 80% were using spreadsheets and stand alone data to manage their environment.

 

MS - Describe for us, what the current H&S environment looks like in terms of automation?

CJ - There are several software vendors that have designed software to help anyone involved in H&S be more efficient and more effective in their everyday work. The software partners I have worked with would help any organization be more proactive. Here are some of the obvious benefits that automation offers:

 

• Reduce administrative overheads
• Fits unique organizational structure
• Embeds H&S culture in daily processes
• Automated action tracking
• instantly create multiple indicators to assess H&S performance
• Instant access to real time data

• Ongoing Return on Investment 

 

Unfortunately, the majority of business's have not invested in an automated system to manage their H&S environment and although many companies would not admit it, they are either unaware of what is out there, how it will help them or just bury their head in the sand and hope that nothing happens to them. I often meet with companies, where their assessments and audits are kept filed away down in the cellar behind a load of old office furniture and have absolutely no idea how compliant they are and what is up to date.

 

MS - So does that compare to office workers using paper based filing systems as opposed to PC's and databases?

CJ - Yes, I would say that more time is spent pushing paper than actually doing the job H&S managers are certified and qualified for.

 

MS - Is this dangerous for business's to operate in that way? Are they really putting themselves at risk?

CJ - Is it wrong? No. Is it dangerous? Maybe. One claim from a member of the public or an employee for a slip trip or fall or a fatality and it's deemed to be the company's fault, or if a business is being sued for an incident involving Asbestos 15 years ago you have still got the auditable information at a click of a button? I would say any company would be putting themselves at risk if they can't prove they have taken every means to reduce risk in the business. The cost of defending one claim in any business, could actually cover the investment in a software solution. Lets put it this way, if your risk assessments are comprehensive, up to date and easily accessible it is more likely that you will avoid an incident in the first place and if a situation does occur, there is a far greater chance of the business being protected.

 

MS - Can people protect themselves from a Corporate Manslaughter charge, using a paper based system?

CJ - I will give you a quote from Section 37 HSWA 1974 section 37(1) "where an offence under any of the relevant statutory provisions committed by a body corporate is proved to have committed with the consent or connivance of, or to have been attributable to any neglect on the part of, any director, manager, secretary or other similar officer of the body corporate or a person who was purporting to acts in such a capacity, he as well as the body corporate shall be guilty of that offence and shall be liable to be proceeded against and punished accordingly"

MS - In plain English "the crown need only prove that a director ought to have known of conduct giving rise to a breach"

CJ - The advantage of an automated system is that it can provide more visibility of non compliance to the business and it can act quickly to rectify it.

 

MS - What cases are currently running?

CJ - I don't know what cases are currently running but here are some examples cases over the last few months:

" A rice manufacturing company has been fined £140,000 after a factory worker was trapped in a conveyor for several hours before dying of shock." Veetee Rice appeared at Maidstone Crown Court on 5 November and pleaded guilty to breaching reg. 11(1) of the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998, for failing to install adequate machine guarding. In addition to the fine, it was ordered to pay £20,500 in costs.

A shipyard worker was crushed to death after being struck by a moving load, which was being lifted by a crane. 

 "The lifting operation was not planned, nor carried out in a safe manner. There was not a single person supervising the lift during the planning stages, which was a major contributing factor to an unsuitable method of work being implemented."
It was fined £85,000 for the HSWA offence, The company must also pay full costs of £21,500.

High street retailer New Look has been fined £400,000 and ordered to pay £136,052 in costs after pleading guilty to two breaches of fire safety legislation, following a serious fire at its Oxford Street store in London.

One charge to which New Look pleaded guilty was for an inadequate fire risk assessment which was found to have a number of flaws.
Other alleged breaches taken into account included the absence of an interface between the swipe card system and the fire alarm panel which would have deactivated the doors.

 

MS - So no Business owner has been jailed under the Corporate Manslaughter act yet then?

CJ - The first prosecution under the Act is due to be heard in February 2010, the case against Cotswold Geotechnical Holdings follows the death of Alexander Wright, a geologist, who was killed in September 2008 when a trench where he had been taking soil samples collapsed.

Company director Peter Eaton has been charged with gross negligence, manslaughter, and for a breach of Section 37 of the 1974 Health and Safety at Work Act.

 

MS - What is the HSE's take on automation? What do they recommend?

CJ - Where the HSE says having an automated system is no guarantee of avoiding prosecution they will always identify that any business that has technology is it recognizes, putting investing into its staff's safety.

 

MS - So what automated systems are out there and what do they do?

CJ - There are lots of people operating in this area and without turning this discussion into a sales pitch, the easiest way to answer that is for people to go to www.blusteelsolutions.co.uk where we provide a list of companies and products.

 

MS - What would a small to medium sized business with approx 100 staff expect to pay for an entry level system that would look after all their Risk Assessments?

CJ - I would say depending on the type of industry and the number of functions that you want the system to perform, you would be looking to invest anything from £5k to £15k

 

MS - Can a system like this really pay for itself?

CJ - Defending just one claim would more than pay for any software system that any company invested in. If having an automated system can save man hours in administration then it can definitely look to pay for itself, especially when there is any duplication of effort taking place.

 

MS - What typically is the impact to the business in terms of disruption when rolling out a system and also with training ?

CJ - Again depending on what system they choose, there is zero impact if they go down the route of investing in a hosted model also very little impact if they want to have a system on their own servers. Most if not all systems are windows based so training is minimal.

 

MS - Of course it's not just Corporate Manslaughter that worries businesses, we also worry about accidents and liable cases being brought against us? What are the standard pay outs for injuries and are they reduced and accidents minimized through the introduction of an automated system?

CJ - In an earlier question you have seen some examples of fines for companies that have had poor practices in regard to fire risk assessments, and working with machinery. Where having an automated system will not always prevent accidents from happening, you will be able to reduce and minimize risk due to monitoring real time data including near misses and being able to put things right before they go wrong. If you put health and safety of your employees at the top of any company agenda, they in turn will report any incidents and best practice can be achieved.   

 

MS - What would your advise be for any companies looking to move to an automated system, as, from what you have said, there appears to be a large number of companies operating in this area now?

CJ - Before moving forward with any automated system try and understand where your pain is and involve your staff, managers, team leaders, directors and the workers. If everyone is talking about health and safety everyone will be managing their own health and safety. 

 

MS - Thank you Charles, this topic was more interesting than I thought it might be. Can you recommend where people can go to look at additional information on this subject and are there any video links that we can also include?

The following sites, including our own, provide lots of relevant information.

www.hse.gov.uk

www.blusteelsolutions.co.uk

www.shponline.co.uk

For a more light hearted view on Health a Safety you can go to the following link to view pictures of the Top 10 breaches of Health & Safety of all time:

Enjoy - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4RKY9u-S8TU&feature=related