Risk Assessment

[kerry davies]

This, has confirmed my own thoughts on allocating either numerical or "traffic light" measurements to RA's. As Ms Hackitt states it isn't about the odds on or against something happening as allocating values to something which is completely dependent on human factors can be counterproductive. She actually says "dangerous".

 

I must commend her on her conclusions;

Would I let my son or daughter do that? Would I be happy to see someone I cared about putting themselves at risk in that way? If the answer is no, then why should you feel comfortable asking someone in your business to do it?

[Just Some Bloke]

I'm afraid that doesn't work at all for me. Would I allow my son or daughter climb to the top of a National Grid pylon and fix a 100,000V power line? No. So using her logic that means we'd all be working in the dark, recharging our laptops from the sun.

 

There is always a risk. There is a risk to making a cup of tea (risk of scalding comes to mind) and we need to do everything in our power to reduce the risk, especially in work situations. But there comes a point beyond which it is unnecesary to reduce the risk any further. Should we stop people who haven't been on a Tea Making Level 1 course from brewing up? No because the risk is below the line. Should we stop people from fixing the National Grid who haven't been on a Level 2 Power Transmission Line Fixing course? Damn right. That is above the line. So there is a line. And if there is a line then it's perfectly relevant to ask where the line is.

[indyld]

I'm afraid that doesn't work at all for me. Would I allow my son or daughter climb to the top of a National Grid pylon and fix a 100,000V power line?

 

Yes, if the risk has been assessed, measures taken and they had undertaken adequate training. As you allude to. Isn't her point that if it's perceived as too great a risk, then it's too great a risk for anyone? Assuming the same level of training etc.

[timd]

If there are people out there who think that by having written a risk assessment they've covered themselves if something goes wrong (or can ask subordinated to do something potentially dangerous), they've clearly missed the point of a risk assessment.

[Brian]

If there are people out there who think that by having written a risk assessment they've covered themselves if something goes wrong (or can ask subordinated to do something potentially dangerous), they've clearly missed the point of a risk assessment.

I think that's part of the problem though; people do a risk assessment and assume everything is now OK.

 

That is until they find themselves in trouble with their risk assessment being pulled apart for not being 'suitable and sufficient'.

[Jivemaster]

Sorry Kerry I disagree with you, and the writer that you quote.

 

Firstly a modern "risk assessment" is a piece of bovine excrement written in an office by someone who wants to win contract. The real RA assesses risk and hazard and then specifies a means of reducing risk and hazard then reassesses risk and hazard until it is truly minimised.

 

Secondly any RA is for a specific task and sometimes a specific operator or level of operator training and experience. I've been a commercial diver long ago so I can meet tasks involving deep water or gas cylinders half way to competence which others may not. This is in general the reason why skilled people are needed in crews.

 

If that fictional relative was IRATA competent then a reasonable rope access job would be safe enough if done correctly, but that job would be unsafe for anyone (related or not) if they were not suitably competent.

[librarian28]

I'm completely with Ms Hackitt on this. It changed my life when I changed my mindset from 'have I covered my arse' to 'have I safe-guarded the arses of my colleagues, clients, public (etc)'. It just takes so much less energy.

 

Who is asking someone to climb a pylon if they are not (to put it loosely) up to the job? The reason we're not working in the dark is because the right people are asking the right people to fix the National Grid.

 

Firstly a modern "risk assessment" is a piece of bovine excrement written in an office by someone who wants to win contract.

No offence taken, but my risk assessments are not bovine excrement. And I'm sure yours aren't either - so that's 2 of us doing our bit. And I'm sure neither of us would engage a contractor who had prepared a ###### risk assessment.

 

If that fictional relative was IRATA competent then a reasonable rope access job would be safe enough if done correctly,

(Sorry, Jivemaster, to pick on two of your points). There is more, of course, to managing a 'safe' project than ensuring that the right person has been asked to do the job.

[kerry davies]

I don't actually understand where Jive disagrees with me and La Hackitt. She states fairly unequivocally that the type of office based tick box assessments sometimes called BS are in reality, BS. So does Jive.

 

Secondly she also states even more strongly that RA's are person and skills dependent which is exactly what Jive says.

 

She clearly agrees with Jive about trained and competent staff being used but her point about her son or daughter is that even the best trained and most competent staff should be "cared for" just as we care for friends and family.

 

I actually believe that Jivemaster is fully in agreement and we are all getting things moving. Next time anyone has any contact with local authorities looking for the bullshit RA, show them JH's words. These blogs of hers are valuable ammunition in the fight against jobsworthism.

[Roderick]

What I find interesting is the separation between people who incorporate safety in their job and those who see it as an add-on.

 

Those who incorporate safety will see, and use, risk assessments for what they are; an assessment of things that could go wrong and what we can do to control or minimise things from going wrong.

Those who see safety as an add-on will use a risk assessment (using that term very loosely) as a excuse not to fix the actual problem in the misguided belief that they have their arses covered.

 

Paperwork has never saved anyone, it is the concepts and principles on the piece of paper that will save lives.

If you have ask what a judge will think about your risk assessment, you clearly haven't understood the concept.

[Ynot]

I'd say one of the key paragraphs in that linked quote from kerry is this:

 

 

Successful risk management is not about ticking boxes or calculating numbers. And it is not about doing things to avoid sanctions. The primary goal is not to avoid a fine or a criminal record, but to stop people being made unwell or being hurt or killed by their work.

 

[accessoperator]

Paperwork has never saved anyone, it is the concepts and principles on the piece of paper that will save lives.

 

A wise quote, and I 100% agree with Roderick.

 

The 'paperwork' serves two functions, the first as a Prompt.

 

Example:

 

When I plan a holiday I like to write 'to do lists or check lists ' this ensures attention to detail and that nothing is overlooked or forgotten... Passport... Yes... Check... Toothbrush... Yes... Check etc.

 

The second is to Communicate, Showing a Level of Understanding.

 

Example:

 

I show my wife the list I have made, in my 'male orientated' role my list did not take into account our two kids or their requirements! My wife tells me to go back and re-write my list to 'include' the kids. So now it is Passports x 3... Yes... Check... Toothbrush x 3... Yes... Check... Small Bottle of Calpol x 1... Yes.... actually second thoughts make that 1 x Big Bottle of Calpol...Yes... Check etc...

 

Paperwork on its own never saved anyone but the process of going through it and communicating it's 'CONTENT' just might.

 

 

 

A liitle 'common sense safety poster' for your office walls:

 

http://www.accessope...ense+Poster.pdf

[Just Some Bloke]

The article linked to in the OP is entitled "How safe is safe enough?" and I'd like to reiterate my point that there has to be a line beyond which is "safe enough" and, therefore, people are at liberty to ask where the line is.

 

Another example: the standard hook clamp that is used to hold a regular generic lantern is made to very high standards and, when used correctly, virtually never fails, yet we all are required to also use a safety bond because someone has decided that a hook clamp on its own is not "safe enough". Far more people are injured every year from scalding when making a cup of tea than from being hit on the head by a lantern on which the hook clamp has failed. So maybe we're saying that it's easier to recover from being scalded than from being killed by a Source Four cracking your skull open from a 10m drop. Again we're talking about a movable line of severity and again we're entitled to ask where the line should be drawn. I'd take a wild guess that more babies are killed from kettle-based scalding than technicians killed by failed hook clamps, by the way.

 

There are lines that delineate how safe is safe enough and it's a lawyer's job to ask where the lines are drawn (and why). And once the lawyers get involved then we're all implicated.

[indyld]

Another example: the standard hook clamp that is used to hold a regular generic lantern is made to very high standards and, when used correctly, virtually never fails, yet we all are required to also use a safety bond because someone has decided that a hook clamp on its own is not "safe enough".

 

Isn't this example a prime candidate for a "box ticking" safety award in our midst?

 

The one thing I've never come to terms with is the dogma (and often very poor application of it, saving the yoke while the heavy bit plummets to the floor is pointless) that goes with secondary safeties on lanterns etc. As you say, statistically insignificant in the extreme compared to far more common and riskier things in life. Barndoors coming adrift, a different matter entirely...

 

But please God, let's not return to a safety chains / bonds conversation again on the BR :-)

[Junior8]

The article linked to in the OP is entitled "How safe is safe enough?" and I'd like to reiterate my point that there has to be a line beyond which is "safe enough" and, therefore, people are at liberty to ask where the line is.

 

I couldn't agree more. And Ms Hackitt might well be right in what she says (though she is being subjective where the one thing that is required is objectivity of course) but she should also, in IMHO, recognize just how much her predecessors at HSE sat back and allowed a whole panoply of regulation to be built up mostly piecemeal and largely unquestioned - because debate was not allowed or silenced with the riposte that any questioner must be against safety. For example one industry which I cover is now controlled by a 93 page guide when in the past common sense, an equipment testing regime, and professional expertise was considered enough. The ACOP addresses risks so statistically insignificant that few if any examples have ever been recorded yet puts in place strategies to prevent them! In the case of serious incidents the remedies at law are exactly the same as they have always been - with the addition of prosecution under HSWE 1974 of course - and as far as I can tell the accident rate in average terms has been the same for nearly 100 years.

[ramdram]

Ref JSB and lanterns falling v scalded babies...the lantern does have a secondary, whereas...

 

And for all we know lanterns are raining constantly off the bars yet countless lives are saved by the secondary safeties...

 

From very recent experience at our venue the F&R compliance bod was interested in the paperwork only. He was not really that fussed about the walk round we virtually pressganged him into. In fact nobody has appeared to do the F&R RA for our venue or even test the FH. Will they bother? Who can say?

 

We took the view that the "official position" is if we failed to deliver on the issues (we say we are going to address) in the RA then "on (y)our own heads be it, consider (y)ourselves warned".

 

I take this to mean if your RA is just a paper exercise to gain your "Get-Out_Of-Jail-Free" card then perhaps you are in the wrong job. I am going to presume further that both the H&S, and DJ involved in your trial, are going to take a very jaded view if all you have in your defence is a nicely written "wish list" marked as "Broadly Compliant".

 

Further, the term RA is not quite right is it...it should be Risk Assessment...AND...appropriate proactive action to eliminate/reduce the risks identified...before the event or whatever occurs.