Hi all,

I'm working at a concert on Monday, and the TM is planning to make the audience pay for hearing protection if they want it. I thougt hearing protection had to be freely available to anyone if the dB was over a certain limit (not sure what this limit is though)? Or is this just for workers? Can anyone shed some light?

Thanks in Advance,

Chris

Under the H&S at work / noise at work regs, employers are obliged to provide PPE should it be necessary to their employees. Audience members turn up of their own free will so there is no obligation for someone who is not their employer to provide such things.

Very true, and as far as Chris is concerned, the punters are not employees.

However, an astute legal mind might one day ask the question, "if you as the person creating the noise think that I need to wear personal protective equipment, are you really fulfilling your duty of care under section 3 (2) of the Control of Noise at Work Regulations 2005:

Where a duty is placed by these Regulations on an employer in respect of his employees, the employer shall, so far as is reasonably practicable, be under a like duty in respect of any other person at work who may be affected by the work carried out by the employer".

Perhaps a remote possibility, but it is a step beyond printing "this concert will be loud" on the reverse of the ticket...

Simon

When we get to the point of offering earplugs to the general public haven't we lost the plot?

Are we stuck in a loudness war, and eventually things will escalate to a Disaster Area (Hitchhikers Guide) situation, where the (now silent and DI'd) band play remotely (to avoid spill to FOH), and the audience retreat to a safe distance with only the lunatics approaching the stacks?

Make a small print or something on the back of the ticket, or at the bottom warning the attendees...

Which will have no legal standing other than to admit that you know that the sounds levels are at a potentially damaging level.

The noise at work regs are there to protect the employees of the venue.
By the venue protecting their staff, they are admitting there is a risk.
This, I am sure admits there is also a risk to the audience members, and through the duty of care of the venue to their customers offering some sort of protection to the audience seems reasonable.

"When we get to the point of offering earplugs to the general public haven't we lost the plot?"
Lots of venues already have them available for customers - usually the cheap yellow foam ones.

Quite agree. I'm sick of gigs being too loud! Just for the sake of it.

Yes, but do they have to be freely available, or available at a price? We're not talking huge here, probably 10p for 2 pairs or something (to cover our costs).

Chris

The issue really is to do with noise dose - I.e. level and duration of exposure. The risk is based not just on level, but how long the employee works in that noisy area. Most of the time, a punter's occasional visit to a loud(ish) gig won't deliver too high a noise dose. The HSE recognises this, and says, "occasional exposure isn't as dangerous as a worker who might experience 8 hours per day, 5 days per week at this noise level, so within reason we are happy". Unfortunately, some gigs are significantly louder than others, and some punters attend concerts more frequently, or listen to iPods set to high levels when not at concerts. The provision of (free?) ear plugs was something that the RNID promoted in their "don't lose the music" campaign. This is a pragmatic approach - rather than trying to silence pubs and clubs and be branded spoilsports, they tried getting people to use some protection and reduce their overall exposure.

However, there is some risk that the sense of responsibility can be diminished if ear plugs are provided - a kind of "we've provided protection for the namby pambies, so let's turn it up and rock".

Given that many venues have still to do anything about Noise at Work 1990, let alone the version that replaced it, I would hold my breath on developments in this area

Simon