All right on site
SELECT Technical team joins Building Safety Group inspection
In 2018, SELECT attained the services of the Building Safety Group (BSG), who are the UK’s largest construction body for health, safety and environmental advice and training.
This soon became another great benefit, with Members enjoying free access to more than 250 templates, policies and documents to help their business provide site-specific and appropriate risk assessments on any work undertaken.
In addition to this free service, Members who work in the construction sector and have multiple ongoing projects in various locations may also be interested in becoming a full member of BSG.
Such membership could be ideal for contractors who require additional information, advice and guidance on how to comply with the relevant statutory health and safety requirements on sites, using BSG’s wide range of services to enhance their health and safety practices, policies and procedures.
One of the services offered by BSG to its members is a robust, on-site inspection service – so to see it in action for ourselves, Director of Technical Services Bob Cairney and I accompanied BSG Safety Adviser Scott Lynch during one of his regular visits.
The inspection started after a formal site induction, during which Scott liaised with the site manager to ascertain the build’s current stage of construction, what works had already been completed and what was currently ongoing on site at the time of the visit.
After an inspection and review of the site policies, facilities and protocols, a walk-round was carried out, led by the site manager. Ongoing works at the time of the inspection included:
Issues with the storage of materials
Steel erectors working at height from a mobile elevated working platform (MEWP)
Foundation excavations for column supports
Manual handling associated with the movement of materials by the erectors.
In addition, the construction work – which is to be carried out in four build phases – had additional risks posed by nearby members of the public and moving vehicles as the site was still open to the public.
During this process, Scott highlighted areas of the site and the works where health and safety aspects, procedures and controls required improvement.
He also informed the site manager where satisfactory processes and protocols were in place and where the appropriate control measures had been implemented to reduce the likelihood of someone being injured if an unfortunate accident or incident were to occur.
After the completion of the walk-round survey, Scott returned to the site office to carry out further assessments of the documentation related to the surveyed works and compiled and finalised the report that was to be issued to the contractor on conclusion of the inspection.
As part of this, all minor discrepancies, health and safety advisories and good practices included in the report were discussed thoroughly with the site manager before the inspection was concluded.
It was certainly a thorough inspection and the attention to detail was very impressive, and this article only gives a small overview of what was an expert and in-depth assessment of just a small phase of a large and difficult construction project.
We know that SELECT Members working on similar projects always aim to provide a safe place of work by implementing good practices and procedures on all aspects of health and safety.
However, to further protect their employees and the public, Members may find the BSG inspection service invaluable and using another pair of expert eyes to see how they could take their health and safety measures to the next level.
“Members who work in the construction sector and have multiple ongoing projects in various locations may also be interested in becoming a full member of BSG”
To find out more about full membership of BSG, contact Membership Development Officer John Puck on johnp@bsgltd.co.uk or call him on 07973 864 011.
