Health & Safety

[RedTrident]

Not a typical day in the office today. I'm in one of these serviced office buildings in the middle of Manchester. There's been builders upstairs for a week banging things about. There's then a huge smash as an air conditioning unit falls out a 3rd storey window and smashes onto the pavement where I'd been stood 5 minutes earlier. Huge row with the builder and the buildings manager follows. This is a fairly busy street and someone could have died.

I was angry enough to spend an hour where I

- call the council who gave me an out of date number for the Health & Safety Executive
- find a number hidden on the HSE's web page that allows you to report fatal or major incidents
- call the number and be given a different number to call
- call that number, be put on hold for 20 minutes to be told I need a different number
- get through to someone who has me fill in a form online
- get an automated email back

All this while the builders are carrying on as normal. Now I understand that it might indeed have been an accident but I'd have liked to have seen someone come out and put a stop to what these builders were doing. Is this normal?

[rog007]

It shouldn't be normal. But the building owners are duty bound to report near misses such as this to their own organisation and the contractors responsible for the accident in order to learn and ensure it doesn't happen again. The local council may be interested too if there's any damage to the pathway. Sounds like a lucky escape!

[lewes]

Section 3 of the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974 says....

3 General duties of employers and self-employed to persons other than their employees
(1) It shall be the duty of every employer to conduct his undertaking in such a way as to ensure, so far as is reasonably practicable, that persons not in his employment who may be affected thereby are not thereby exposed to risks to their health or safety.

Its not acceptable, get it reported

[Keep it stiff]

I suggest you take the matter up with the landlord/building owner who employed the builder. He is equally responsible and I suspect if the builder and would have been in the dock along with the builder if anyone had been killed. If the builder is a one man band type I suspect the landlord/owner will take this a whole lot more seriously than the builder. If work is still on-going it is all the more important that this is followed through.

[Keep it stiff]

I suggest you take the matter up with the landlord/building owner who employed the builder. He is equally responsible and I suspect if the builder and would have been in the dock along with the builder if anyone had been killed. If the builder is a one man band type I suspect the landlord/owner will take this a whole lot more seriously than the builder. If work is still on-going it is all the more important that this is followed through.

[Rovinghawk]

IIRC a fall of anything over 50kg is RIDDOR reportable. Google your local HSE office & mention it.

[Art0ir]

Just up from Oxford Road Station perchance?

[chadders74]

Manchester City Council - Health & Safety ask to speak to a Senior Environmental Health Officer in the H&S team.

[lewes]

Rovinghawk said:

IIRC a fall of anything over 50kg is RIDDOR reportable. Google your local HSE office & mention it.

That's a new one to me, me thinks you've got it mixed up