Trethewey and Lindsay pledge to run a tight ship on the site – with method statements and risk assessments drawn up prior to inductions and toolbox talks, as well as site-supervisor inductions. The school is also being built on the same site as the existing school, so Kier has been careful to engage with the schoolchildren to explain the safety implications and dangers of having a construction site so close, and re-routing the access path to the existing school grounds so that pedestrian and site segregation are strictly maintained.
Various other design and construction features are contributing to safety on the project, too. A cut-and-fill earth-moving process, for example, helps reduce the need to transport waste off the island – reducing costs as well as risks in the handling of waste materials – while the soil can be redistributed to maintain a more even gradient.
Reduced emphasis on wet trades and increased prefabrication also help eliminate waste and manpower on site, and consequently reduce the risks to worker safety, and the impact on their health from dust and noise fumes.
Final thoughts
Given the remote setting, the amount of planning that has been involved, and the sense that the regulator – i.e. the HSE – is ‘out of the picture’, it is encouraging to see that health and safety appears to be at the heart of the construction work being carried out.
You get the feeling if David Cameron were to visit Scilly, he would use the islands’ community spirit as a paragon of the Big Society ethic. But, equally, it might be suggested to him that if he could inject as much recognition for health and safety more generally across construction sites on Britain’s mainland, the positive impact on people’s lives could be even more tangible.
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Nothing new here; over the last few years we have invested a lot of time and effort introducing gloves into the work place as part of every day PPE. Working alonside Polyco, gloves have been developed to suit the risk level associated with the task. Horses for courses as they say! there is a type of glove out there whatever your trade or task. Introducing the policy ofwearing gloves was difficult at first, but is now accepted as everyday practice.