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Posted: Wed May 04, 2011 7:40 pm
by rab1
Hen, your right mate. I`ve seen it more often than family guy, along with the tadger charlie that blew up the refinery.
I`m not the HSE Gestapo etc but for you lads follow a few simple rules and keep your ass out of court.
New to site, brief the lads on the site conditions and if any plant is being used explain the risks of working beside this kit. Using the basic PPE, if their using a Stihl saw offer ear plugs and a mask etc.
Make sure they sign that you have taken the time to explain all of this along with for all of the PPE you have supplied.
Your not a multinational so make up a small a4 sheet and scan it onto the computer an save, if anything ever does go wrong, you did your bit......
???
Posted: Wed May 04, 2011 10:19 pm
by henpecked
It has sparked some good debate. Im not surprised at how we all work differently on here, you could all agree on how a slab goes down but not on methodology.
Interesting thread, hope its not taken as singling anyone out, its just thrashing out interpretations of how we all do it.
(although my way is still the best-est :p )
Posted: Sat May 07, 2011 10:25 pm
by DNgroundworks
Just one last thing, put all the legal/prosecution stuff aside i know blokes that have had tickets for years for excavators and they are fecking useless, constantly knocking tracks off, running over barrows, so having a ticket doesnt automatically mean that your an ace driver, i know the courts wouldnt see it that way anyway, but yano what i mean!
But ye we always use water with the stihl, ear defenders - a must for me, also we were on site a few months ago had to wear goggles and gloves all the time as well as hardhats and hi viz no t-shirts neither.
BTW i have no direct employees anymore just sub contractors with their own insurances.
:p
Posted: Sat May 07, 2011 10:36 pm
by seanandruby
.....That's why you need banksmen. Your always going to get the odd idiot who isn't very good in anything they do but you are still liable if they are in your employment, you must do risk asessements and method statements and they must sign that they have read it and understand it. We have to wear safety glasses, gloves, hi-viz etc all the time, ear defenders where necessary and dust masks on certain tasks. I'm upgrading manholes remedial work and wear all the above plus contamination suit.
Posted: Sat May 07, 2011 11:00 pm
by henpecked
TBH some of the mandatory requirements of today are very useful, as you have said water on saw cutting . You wouldn't have seen that at all ten years ago, the more dust meant you were working harder :laugh:
Gloves too, I was really anti gloves till I started to wear them. They made all the difference you didnt get cakes of sh1t under our nails for one and you didnt snag the wife tights when you fancied abit 
Posted: Sat May 07, 2011 11:46 pm
by Tommy
No matter how much you legislate for a problem, it only takes someone to feel a bit under the weather, or thinking about a new bit on the side, and it only takes a lapse of a split second, and lives could be in danger. We are only human afterall.
Posted: Sun May 08, 2011 8:14 am
by henpecked
I remember working on Walsall Manor Hospital, the whole thing was one massive pour the guys on the groundwork had their own banks-men but the labour where imported from the sub-continent.
They were on the 3rd floor lowering a slab in place and it became a banks-man frenzy with all these guys trying to bank the slab in (wasn't big 2mx3m) anyway the wind caught the slab and pinned one of the labourers (who shouldn't have been there) heads to a column. He flapped it and luckily enough, his hat stopped and serious damage as he ducked out, the hat remained between the slab and the column. Shouldn't lol, but it was a brown trouser moment for him . :laugh: :laugh:
Posted: Sun May 08, 2011 8:06 pm
by rab1
H/S has in my personal opinion gone too far in certain things, kids not allowed to play football on a wet pitch etc but in construction people died.
The head of safety for AMEC once told me that this is all being done to protect the idiot on site, we all know the type.
95% of us look at the job to be done and evaluate the risks to suit the situation in hand rather than just steaming in. As Sean says use a Banks man, you have a reversing 20t delivery wagon, have one of the lads watching as it is reversing and unloading especially as you lads do domestic work, kids dont know the dangers we do. ???
Posted: Sun May 08, 2011 8:29 pm
by ilovesettsonmondays
thats what i should have done rab when i was a l o r site. wasnt looking on my first day too as a 20 tonne tipper ran over my stihl saw 
Posted: Sun May 08, 2011 8:37 pm
by rab1
I`ll check the laptop as I`m sure we have a clause in there somewhere where you can kill the driver for that...! :O