Written by Nick Garland on Wednesday December 13th 2023
I’ve written several times about the Asbestos Network (AN)’s personal sampling and exposure guidance, which was published in August. Both ARCA and ACAD have spent a good percentage of their recent regionals taking members through the details – of which there are lots.
This guidance covers a very important topic that as an industry we have struggled with, and it’s been worth the wait. It’s a fairly weighty 21-page document. Overall it’s very much aimed at the licensed contractor – i.e. the sharp end – but it’ll be useful to analysts and end-clients too.
This is the first official guidance that the AN (and therefore the Health and Safety Executive) has provided to licence contractors on the subject. And there are some major departures from how contractors traditionally approach it.
That’s why we’re hosting a webinar to talk in detail about the changes that the guidance demands. We’ll be exploring practical steps on how to implement them, and demonstrating how you can use Assure360 to achieve full compliance – at the same time as saving hours of work for both your supervisors and admin team.
So whether you’re an Assure360 customer or not, please join us on January 16, 2024. To book your place, please just fill in the details below. We hope to see you there!
Written by Nick Garland on Thursday March 9th 2023
Friday the 24th February was a big day for me, albeit one that probably wasn’t on your radar. For some time I’ve been planning a workshop on the infamous four-stage clearance (4SC), and I was delighted to take the lead on delivering this inaugural event for FAAM.
This wasn’t just another P404 – BOHS’ official training course on 4SCs – but a unique attempt to bridge the gap between two sides of our industry: analysts, and licensed asbestos removal contractors (LARCs).
The very fact that we all understand what I mean by ‘two sides’ hints at the suspicion and conflict that exists between removalists and analysts. It’s been getting worse over the last 20 years, as the pressure increases on the 4SC – and in particular the visual inspection – as the key check on licensed removal work. Today, the 4SC is the cauldron where the pressures of business come up against the mandatory checks of heavy regulation. Improving the process, and adding to everyone’s understanding, is one of the biggest challenges we have.
With fellow FAAM committee members Louis Slattery of Air Surveys, and Cat Holmes of ION, we tried something new – a practical session to bring together experienced supervisors and analysts so that they could learn from each other. While we didn’t know quite what to expect, we hoped they’d each benefit from the strengths of the other, and also that they’d get an insight into each other’s point of view. The ideal outcome would be better communication and ultimately a stronger team attitude.
We used the fabulous facilities at Airborne Environmental Consultants (AEC) in Manchester, where they have full-scale mock enclosures set up. We focused on the first two key stages of the process.
With the attendees placed into analyst / supervisor pairs, they were thrown in to do the preliminary stage one inspection, where we saw the strengths of the supervisors coming to the fore. And while the supervisors obviously felt in their element, it was also great to hear a different viewpoint from the analysts, and see an instant rapport building between the two. The following debrief was also refreshing, with everyone being open in revealing gaps in their knowledge or things that they might have missed.
After lunch were two realistically mocked up enclosures with a host of issues hidden in each. Now the analysts showed their experience – not particularly with the significant failings, as both members of the team easily found those – but more in their ability to find the small things. We had the pleasure of witnessing analysts’ ‘dark arts’: the carefully angled use of a torch to reveal settled dust, or mirrors to inspect behind and under obstacles. It’s an amazing skill set, so crucial in preventing an unsafe enclosure being handed back.
The final debrief was as good as the first. For me personally there were two significant moments in the end-of-the-day chat. While everyone knew that it is the LARC’s duty to ensure that the enclosure is 100% clean, changes to the handover certificate were also brought up – for the first time the supervisor’s name is being attached to this liability, making them more directly responsible.
For me, the logical conclusion of this personal liability is that it should reposition analysts as the supervisor’s best friend. After all, they’re the final backstop before the supervisor’s enclosure is handed back.
This discussion produced another eye-opener for us all. Although it’s always been the LARC’s responsibility to ensure that an enclosure is free from asbestos when handed back, supervisors have never been given formal training in this as part of their initial or refresher training. This is something I’d personally always assumed was included. And if that incorrect assumption runs all the way up to the Health and Safety Executive (HSE), it would lead to this critical competence issue being overlooked at licence assessment.
I and the other organisers hope that this will be the first of many workshops, with feedback provided to the FAAM conference, and ultimately that our findings will also inform future analyst and supervisor training. The ideal outcome is that joint training in this key competency becomes a routine reality.
I’d like to extend my special thanks to Kellie Naughton of AEC, Ian Halpin of RSK, Liam Bodger of Emchia, Nick Butters of ABP, Aidie O’Neil of East Coast Insulation, Nicola Ratcliffe of TRAC-Associates, John Malloy of RS Asbestos, Neil Hardy of IATP and Phil Roberts of the HSE, who all very generously gave up their time to make this workshop possible.
Written by Nick Garland on Wednesday December 7th 2022
The recent Work and Pensions Committee report on asbestos management has started to move the conversation in some very positive directions. I wrote recently of how 13 of the committee’s 16 recommendations had been taken up by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE), which was actively investigating how to implement them. As I understand it, such a positive hit rate from a select committee report is near unheard of.
One recommendation that isn’t being adopted is that there should be a national database of asbestos. Like many in the industry, I’ve written about the shortsightedness of this decision, but it has had a very interesting result – the industry is attempting to fill the void itself.
This is principally happening through two initiatives. In the first, UKNAR, Asbestos Smart and Open Asbestos are working to bring all of the asbestos software companies together. The goal is to make it easier to communicate asbestos registers to the people at risk, i.e. those that need to know.
The second initiative owes its existence mostly to the HSE’s assertion that we don’t know what we don’t know. In other words, that there isn’t much data available to measure the effectiveness of duty holders’ management of asbestos in the real world. And what evidence the HSE does have (through visits to properties) is broadly very positive.
Now, the asbestos consultants reading this would have mostly spat their tea out, as it didn’t match what we were seeing. Happily, ATaC and NORAC stepped up to investigate and create a report on what we really do know. Their exercise is intended to be repeated annually, so that we will effectively get a grade card of how well we are doing and how things are changing over time.
The result is a very impressive example of joint research and collaboration. The data set is vast, taking in more than a million lines of information. The data covered 128,761 individual sites, and of these, 100,660 contained asbestos-containing materials (ACMs). The analysis was complicated by the range of terminology used, and some significant reconciliation was needed. Despite this, the study was able to produce some really impressive headline stats.
Damage in the details
A total of 710,433 ACMs were identified. These were mostly non-licensed materials, but some 157,940 (spread over 32,814 buildings) were the higher risk ACMs such as asbestos insulation board (AIB) and pipe insulation. Some 10,054 (6%) of these ‘licensable’ ACMs were deemed to have medium damage, and 19,347 (12%) high damage.
The researchers also segregated between new surveys and reinspection reports (i.e. known asbestos that was being re-checked as part of a management plan). The latter showed:
It’s clearly a very impressive piece of research, and as a point-in-time spot check on asbestos it is an enormously useful data set. But other than “we still have a lot of asbestos” and “there is a long road yet to walk”, what does it tell us?
It’s clear that the report isn’t set up to be a worthy, academic piece. In fact, I think that its messaging was intentionally straightforward. The bulk of the report is given over to ‘Findings’, but it’s actually a blend of the findings and the authors’ take on what this data means.
To my eyes there’s a lack of nuance. For example, in one of the sections it suggests that the very fact that reinspection surveys identified 10,452 ACMs with high damage indicates that either:
The report suggests that either way it demonstrates poor management of the risk. That might be the case, but it could also be that the number was nearer to 12,000 a year ago, and that the duty holders are prioritising their remediation plan, for example by locking away the rest so it is no risk to anyone. The same information could now be seen as evidence of excellent management. We just don’t know.
Perhaps I’m looking at it too deeply, and the point of this first report is just to get the attention of the layperson. I certainly hope it achieves that, but its real value (and it should be huge) will come when it’s repeated year on year. Do we see the percentage of asbestos in poor condition reducing? Are we eliminating ACMs? Are we moving fast enough?
Or, as the report seemingly indicates now, are we actually seeing inactivity, and an attitude more akin to box-ticking than active management of risk? I look forward to finding out, and for us all to be able to act on the answer.
Written by Nick Garland on Wednesday May 11th 2022
As you’ll no doubt all be aware, the Work and Pensions Committee has been conducting an inquiry into the Health and Safety Executive (HSE)’s approach to asbestos management. In its report, published in April, the committee calls for a raft of changes, including a proposed 40-year deadline for the removal of all asbestos from public buildings.
Predictably, I’ve already seen people commenting that 40 years is far too long, while others say the reverse and wonder how we’ll ever pay for it! But the asbestos management report is a substantial document, and I wanted to look at the changes and recommendations behind the headline. The committee has heard many opposing views from industry experts, campaigning groups, charities, victims groups, government ministers and the HSE itself, and to its credit has produced a well-balanced set of proposals that deserve greater scrutiny.
The balance of evidence
Like most in our industry, I’ve been following the progress of the inquiry and the evidence presented to it. Everyone has their own opinion, but there were a couple of witness testimonies that I took issue with. In December, Professor Julian Peto of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine suggested caution over the mandatory removal of all asbestos, pointing out research in the 1980s showing that airborne asbestos levels in buildings were higher six months after removal than before.
I’ve no reason to doubt that research, but I have first-hand knowledge of how comparatively poor asbestos-removal techniques were when I started my career in the 1990s. In the 1980s it must have been even worse, as analysts weren’t even doing independent clearances back then. I’d be astonished if the equivalent research, conducted today, didn’t reach a very different conclusion.
In February, HSE chief executive Sarah Albon claimed that the 60% drop in asbestos enforcement notices over the last 10 years was evidence of better compliance. However, when we compare 2012/13 with 2019/20 (the most recent pre-pandemic period for which figures are available):
What this suggests to me is that the HSE targeted the companies it thought would be the worst offenders, and pretty much saw what it expected, giving it a much higher hit rate of Prohibition Notices.
If that’s the case, then the figures rather undermine the suggestion of improved compliance. Instead, they suggest to me that some companies are simply avoiding having their collar felt, and I’m not alone. As Darren Evans of Asbestos Training and Consulting (ATaC) told the committee: “There are lots of people out there taking an informed view that they are unlikely to be visited, and therefore corners are cut.”
Let me stress that I’m not blaming the HSE here. Over the 10 years to 2019/20 the organisation experienced a 46% drop in funding – it did well not to cut visits even further.
Regardless of the details, the committee has managed to distil a mound of evidence and come up with some well considered proposals. The report’s key recommendations are:
As I said, these are all well-balanced proposals. It’s hard to argue against any of them, but I can see a particular subset with the potential to bring the fastest, greatest benefits. Five particular points would have an obvious, immediate impact on safety and good management:
Just these five, if acted upon, would have the potential to transform our knowledge and our ability to act appropriately. Let me explain further.
Competence of dutyholders
We are long used to the absolute requirement for access to competent health and safety advice – why should it be any different for asbestos? This has always been something I care about, in all my work with clients – the central pillar is to ensure that they end up more capable of asking the right question at the right time. For large organisations, having this requirement might mean having someone on the books who is P405 qualified. For smaller companies it might be having the right health and safety consultant on retainer.
Digital Register
Whatever we are doing, we’re likely to be more diligent and careful if we know our work is going to be checked. We see the evidence of this all the time in asbestos management: there’s a difference between an unannounced audit and one where they knew you were coming, or a visual inspection with the UKAS assessor in attendance. If organisations know that they’ll be uploading their asbestos survey to the HSE, they’ll do it better. Just the very fact that a survey or register could be independently checked at any time will benefit standards hugely.
Accreditation of Surveyors
It’s always been unexplained why asbestos analysts must be accredited, but it’s only advisable for companies conducting a survey. It’s very costly to get and maintain accreditation, so it’s only really accessible to established organisations. But being un-accredited doesn’t necessarily mean bad – smaller firms and individuals may be unwilling or unable to go down that route.
Regardless, we currently have a situation where UKAS accredited companies must compete commercially against non-accredited companies and individual surveyors – that’s not a level playing field.
Interestingly the recommendation in this regard is that accreditation should be compulsory for the individuals conducting surveys, not the firms employing them. This change would immediately level things out: large and small firms along with individual surveyors should be able to demonstrate competence.
I’d expect that surveyors would welcome this professionalisation of the industry, as the employment power would be devolved down to them. The change wouldn’t allow companies to shirk their responsibilities, as it will remain their duty to ensure competence of the workforce.
Research
If the priority is to focus on schools and hospitals, just how big is the problem there? The short answer is that nobody knows, as very little research has been done. What we do know is that some schools have a good deal of asbestos-containing materials in them. We also know that young lungs are much more susceptible to damage from asbestos, and that youngsters are practically (and legally) considered not to be competent. This latter is crucial as ‘competent workforce’ is an important pillar in the current approach to managing in situ.
I’ve discussed the unique problem of asbestos in schools before, and the risks faced by teachers and pupils alike. As with other public buildings, UK policy has been to manage asbestos in place, but what little research this is based on is now well and truly out of date. Before we settle on any change in policy, we need to know for sure that removal is the safer option.
Increased Enforcement
I’ve said it before, but the 1974 Health and Safety at Work Act is a beautifully written piece of regulation. If you render it down to a couple of sentences, it essentially says: “The employer must be an expert in their field, must understand the risks, and must eliminate them as much as they can. And if they don’t there will be dire consequences.”
The author was very cleverly identifying that proscriptive legislation would never be able to keep up with the best and safest way to operate across multiple industries in a changing world, but that a regulator would be able to use the power of hindsight to identify if something could have been done better.
And that’s where the HSE comes in. It’s vital that they are out there making checks and serving up enforcements to ensure things are done better. To recall Darren Evan’s point, companies need to know they cannot cut corners, because they will be caught.
Will it happen?
I’ve focused on these five very positive recommendations, because together they would improve our knowledge of the problem, make the scale of the issue visible, and leave dutyholders in no doubt that they need to act appropriately. However, they would also represent an increase in costs to business, an increase in health and safety regulation, and an increase in funding for a public body (the HSE).
None of these things have been particularly popular with the UK government for a decade or more. For several years there has been an effective ‘one in one out’ rule for new regulations. Consequently, much of the HSE’s excellent guidance of late has had to be be sneaked out as appendices to Asbestos Network meeting minutes – not exactly the ideal situation.
I would like to end, though, on a point of optimism, from Charles Pickles from the campaign group Airtight on Asbestos. Responding to the report, he told me it was a rejection of the existing line that asbestos was “yesterday’s problem: nothing to see here”.
Instead, he said, it’s a move to acknowledge that “we have a problem with current exposure, and we need a plan to deal with it”. The Work and Pensions Committee has asked the HSE for its plan, and soon. And as Charles put it: “That really is a significant move.”
Written by Nick Garland on Thursday February 10th 2022
One of the main objectives of the new analysts’ guide is to reduce analyst exposure, by clarifying what is licensed work, and what falls under the analyst’s remit. But the HSG 248 document is now massive, running to 238 pages. In cases where it hasn’t been fully read and understood there’s the potential for misunderstanding.
I’ve been thinking about this after a recent project, in which a difference in understanding created the risk of costs spiralling out of control. The project in question related to a wall that had sporadic asbestos insulation spatters underneath an imperfect layer of paint. The job was to scrape the wall back and then encapsulate the residues – so far so normal.
However, in this case the analyst was unwilling to enter the enclosure prior to encapsulation. This created the potential situation that, if the analyst wasn’t happy with their visual after encapsulation, the licensed asbestos removal contractor (LARC) would have to strip all the paint off and start again. The analyst’s view was that the project was not yet finished, the enclosure was therefore live, and that in line with HSG 248, ‘they do not do live enclosure entry’. For the LARC it represented a very expensive project risk.
So what does the guidance suggest? On the surface of it, HSG 248 is fairly ‘clear’:
The nature and extent of exposure will depend on several factors including the activity, the type and condition of the ACM and the effectiveness of any controls. For example, all entry into asbestos enclosures carries a risk of exposure to airborne fibres. Analysts should avoid as far as possible entering ‘live’ enclosures while removal or remediation work is still being carried out. If entry into a ‘live’ enclosure does occur there will be potential exposure to asbestos fibre concentrations above the control limit or short-term exposure limit.
Para 1.6, Pg 11 HSG248
However, if we look deeper (and when I say deeper, I mean we have to read to page 193) there’s more guidance under the section “Clearance for specific situations” – the bold is mine, for emphasis:
Inaccessible or impossible to remove asbestos
Spray-applied asbestos is often found in crevices or holes through walls where pipe work or girders run. These may leave asbestos residues that are impossible to remove. In these cases, the analyst may permit the use of non-flammable sealant such as foams or plaster to fill the hole and seal the asbestos within it. Before the sealant is applied the analyst must be satisfied that as far as reasonably practicable the asbestos has been removed.
Para A5.78, Pg 193 HSG248
Use of encapsulant or sealant
Where asbestos has been sprayed on to porous surfaces (e.g. breeze blocks, bricks, plaster and concrete), it is almost impossible to obtain an asbestos-free surface. The analyst should satisfy themselves that further removal is not reasonably practicable, and should advise the contractor and/or building client to seal the residual asbestos with a permanent proprietary sealant. The visual inspection can restart once the sealant has been applied and dried. In these circumstances encapsulation of asbestos should not take place before the analyst has seen the residual asbestos. A note should be made on the CfR and recorded in the asbestos register and management plan for the premises.
Para A5.80 Pg 194 HSG248
This second paragraph matches my example situation perfectly, but in fact both paragraphs make clear that the analysts must complete a visual before the LARC encapsulates any remaining asbestos to make sure (essentially) they are not hiding anything. While the general guidance in paragraph 1.6 says that analysts should avoid live enclosures ‘as far as possible’, this subsequent guidance takes us to the heart of the issue – a live enclosure is one where removal work is ongoing. In these situations, the enclosures are not ‘live’ as all possible removal has been finished.
Going further
In fact, my personal preference is to go a step further. I believe all such projects should be broken down like this:
With either option after the stage three air test, the client gets valuable extra information that they wouldn’t get with the traditional approach. Based on what happens, they know to what degree they need to be cautious about the wall.
This is my personal preference, and I’d be interested to hear opposing views on it, so let me explain my reasoning. First, read this rather long paragraph from the Analysts’ Guide:
There may be occasions when some asbestos is to remain in situ in the enclosure. It may be that only damaged asbestos lagging is being removed from pipe work, and that undamaged material is to remain; or it could be that only a proportion of asbestos ceiling tiles is being removed. The analyst should have been made aware of this in the discussion on the scope of work as part of stage 1. The contractor should have checked the condition of the remaining ACMs as materials in poor condition could lead to a failure in the four-stage clearance when the analyst checks. If the analyst does find asbestos materials in poor condition these will need to be dealt with (eg repaired, encapsulated or removed, all of which actions are likely to need agreement of the building client and the involvement of a licensed contractor. The four-stage clearance should stop at this point and the contractor/building client should be informed. The four-stage clearance should not restart until the matters have been rectified. Any remaining ACMs in good condition should be recorded in the CfR so that the building client can update the asbestos register and management plan accordingly.
Para A5.76 Pg 192 HSG248
My logic is that if we are working on a wall that only ever had occasional splashes of debris – the risk starts at low. If:
The selection of the scrape and vac technique is therefore intentionally leaving some asbestos in by design, and paragraph A5.76 is the reference that we should be looking to. This allows the analyst to make a judgement that all loose paint has been removed, and the asbestos left in by design would be noted on the four-stage clearance (4SC) certificate.
While we haven’t 100% removed the asbestos-containing material (some is being left in by design), stage two has passed, and there is no absolute need for encapsulation. But if the air test subsequently identifies a problem then we must encapsulate. On the other hand, if the whole 4SC passes, and we still want to encapsulate, well, that’s an ultra risk-averse decision that can be completed as a non-licensed activity.
I appreciate this is possibly a left field opinion, but I believe it addresses what we are trying to do which is understand and mitigate risk, rather than blindly follow what we’ve done before.
Written by Nick Garland on Wednesday January 19th 2022
We’re already a fortnight into 2022, the schools are back, and our focus is well and truly on the year ahead. It’s a sad reality that we’re all still living with the risk and disruption of Covid-19, but it does seem likely that this will be the year we move towards living with the virus. And as the policy shifts away from trying to contain it, it’s likely that in some ways this will be a more normal year than 2020 or 2021.
So what can we expect in the construction and asbestos industries? First and foremost, it seems that we’ll see a return of more in-person events. As it stands, most major industry events in 2022 seem likely to go ahead in person, which should bring more opportunities to network and catch up with colleagues we may not have seen for some time.
At Assure360, we’re seizing the opportunity, and kicking the year off with the return of our popular breakfast meetings. If you’re not familiar, these serve as a warm up to selected ACAD regional meetings, and provide an opportunity for existing customers to discuss the future direction and evolution of the Assure360 system. It’s our community’s biggest opportunity to help shape the next stage of Assure360 development.
The meetings aren’t just for existing customers, though. Me and my brother, Rick Garland, will be happy to provide all comers with an overview of the system. We’ll be able to answer any questions and give demonstrations, all while you enjoy a light breakfast. So please do come along to one of the following:
Please RSVP via our LinkedIn events pages or by email to enquiries@assure360.co.uk so we can confirm numbers for catering.
Other events
It’s hard to predict exactly how the rest of the year will pan out, but among the big events likely to go ahead, the Hazardous Materials Expo is set for 14-15 September at the NEC. Assuming the situation allows for it, expect a return to a much bigger event than has been possible for the last two years.
We also hope that the improving situation lets the 10th international symposium on modern principles of air monitoring and biomonitoring (Airmon 10) go ahead. Originally scheduled for last September, it’s now planned for 7-10 November. As always, we’ll be trying to keep our regular events listing updated as more events are announced or confirmed.
Finally, a reminder that the Work and Pensions Committee is continuing its examination of how the Health and Safety Executive manages the continued presence of asbestos in buildings. After a call for evidence and the first oral evidence sessions last year, the committee will continue its work of examining the risks, how the HSE manages them, and how UK practice compares to the rest of the world.
As we said, it’s hard to predict exactly how the year will pan out, but we can hope that things return more closely to normal as vaccination and other measures help bring Covid under control. However things develop, we wish you all the best throughout 2022 and beyond.
Written by Nick Garland on Wednesday January 19th 2022
I originally wrote this review of the Asbestos Network technical committee’s upcoming guidance on DCU safety two years ago, and in some ways not a great deal has changed since. The guidance is still in draft, still imminent, and still missing some of the more practical direction on safety that I identified.
Part of the issue is that the scope of the guidance is limited to gas and electrical installations, but in reality the DCU represents a wider range of risks. In particular, I feel it’s now important to revisit the draft guidance in the light of Colette Willoughby’s raw and emotional testimony at FAAM last year. With the benefit of Colette’s experiences and insight, it’s clear that we must also consider analysts’ personal safety.
We all know that the job of asbestos removal is dangerous – that’s why it’s so tightly regulated. But while the most serious risks are often found inside the enclosure, they don’t stop there. The decontamination unit (DCU) presents its own hazards, including:
So what guidance is available, and how can it help keep analysts and operatives safe?
For the last two years the Asbestos Network technical committee has made time in several meetings to discuss DCU safety. Unfortunately they’ve made slow progress in producing guidance, and the final version hasn’t been issued.
I wanted to revisit what there is so far. For the most part it’s good stuff, but the way I perceive our workplace changed at the 2021 FAAM conference. Colette opened my eyes to additional risks faced by female analysts, which can and must be addressed. In this light, DCU guidelines that focus only on electrical and gas safety are missing a major opportunity to protect our colleagues.
Colette’s FAAM talk has shone a light on what should have been blindingly obvious for decades – decontaminating in the DCU represents a very vulnerable moment for a female analyst.
The Construction (Design and Management) regulations state: “Separate washing facilities must be provided for men and women, except where they are provided in a room the door of which is capable of being secured from the inside, and the facilities in each room are intended to be used by only one person at a time.”
As we know, DCUs are shared, yet their access is controlled by an external lock. Obviously this isn’t compliant. What has also become obvious, given the experiences detailed by Colette and the other female analysts she has spoken to, is that it’s simply not appropriate protection for our colleagues at a vulnerable time.
I am sure that the makers of DCUs can and should implement better solutions that give the occupant of the DCU control over entry and exit. But in the meantime, adding a simple bathroom-style bolt to all of the doors would seem like a very easy and quick solution. Clearly, there would also need to be a revised DCU procedure, as the unit would not be accessible from the time the analyst leaves it secured, until the point they leave the enclosure and fully decontaminate. During this time it would effectively become a one-person unit, but this is not that different to current, Covid-era practice, where operatives’ exit from the enclosure is staggered so as to be one at a time.
Another significant issue raised by Colette is that disposable underwear is simply not available for women. Laundering services for contaminated clothing don’t seem to be commercially available, either. Employers need to find an acceptable interim solution – such as using standard underwear or swimsuits and disposing of them after a single use.
The following is predominately unchanged from my review a year ago and concentrates on the physical issues covered (or not covered) by the guidance.
The gas safety guidance starts predictably enough, instructing that gas boilers should meet the required BS EN standards, that they should be installed by an accredited gas fitter, and that each appliance should be fitted with an isolating valve and flame failure device. However, it then goes on to say that all boilers situated in the clean end – rather than a sealed cupboard – should be of the balanced flue type.
For those of us who aren’t gas engineers, in a balanced flue (also known as room-sealed) boiler, the entire combustion circuit is sealed off from the room that the boiler’s in. The fresh air supply, combustion chamber, heat exchanger and exhaust gases are open to the atmosphere only, meaning that if something goes wrong, any toxic or flammable gases should be vented out of the DCU.
Insisting on this type is wise, as they’re much safer than open flue boilers which draw their combustion air from the room they’re in, but following the guidelines might mean an expensive upgrade for any older DCUs.
There are some other issues to pick up on. If the boiler is mounted in a separate sealed cupboard it is best practice for that boiler to be room-sealed anyway, but regardless the cupboard door must be closed and sealed at all times. Many times I’ve seen cupboard doors left open, sometimes for convenience, but sometimes because there is otherwise insufficient ventilation in the cupboard for the boiler to work. If the boiler only works when you leave the cupboard door open, then it’s effectively in the clean end, and must be room-sealed.
It’s important to understand that a room-sealed boiler doesn’t guarantee that combustion products like carbon monoxide (CO) can’t leak into the room. Seals can fail, so there should always be a CO alarm fitted in the clean end, adjacent to the vent to the shower compartment. Correct positioning is important – I’ve seen random locations, not all of which will be effective according to the guidance.
The guidance here pretty much summarises existing standard guidance. In brief, the gas bottle(s) should be:
Note, too, that there should be a maximum of two 16kg bottles, and that nothing spark-generating should be stored with them.
So far, so standard, but then we get to areas where I’m not sure we have much compliance. Gas bottles should be:
There’s some welcome clarity here: DCUs require mandatory 12-monthly gas-safety certificates. Some HSE inspectors are still referring to a very old note that mandated six-monthly inspections for open-flued units. This detailed guidance supersedes and clarifies this.
In day-to-day use, the gas pipework needs to be checked daily and at the end of the project – not a job that I’ve seen on many supervisor checklists. There should also be emergency procedures to follow if gas is smelled. The advice states that gas should be isolated at the end of the shift, but it then goes on to contradict itself, suggesting that if there’s no oil-filled radiator the pilot light should be left running in cold weather. Presumably, this will be cleared up in the final pre-publication checks.
All vents, clearly, need to be kept clear. If you have an open-flue boiler in a sealed cupboard, that cupboard needs to be kept closed and the seals must be in good condition. In all cases the CO alarm must be checked at least weekly.
This is usually the area that gets the most attention when a job is audited, but the justification for this seems patchy at best. To my knowledge there has never been a DCU electrocution, so the previous guidance has clearly been serving us well.
This guidance states that all DCUs must regularly be electrically inspected and tested – we rarely see units that haven’t been. In fact, the biggest risk is likely to come from using the client’s mains supply if it turns out to be faulty. The moment of greatest risk is brief – when an individual is standing on the floor, but touching the metal frame of the DCU.
The guidance offers some pointers on how to eliminate electrocution risks:
However the guidance really calls for better design of DCUs to ensure better electrical separation, along the lines of a bathroom. Generally there should be layers of insulation between electricity and people, and the power for recharging masks should come from two-pin, low-voltage sockets. Where there are concerns about the quality of the source electrical supply, it’s perhaps wisest to use a single-phase generator rated below 10kVA, which doesn’t need earthing at all.
As I laid out last year, another pressing DCU safety issue relates to the risks when positioning them. DCUs are heavy beasts. Moving them using a vehicle presents multiple hazards, and manoeuvring them by hand typically takes more than one person. Both approaches require coordination and well-designed procedures to prevent workers from being trapped or injured, yet these are all too often overlooked.
I personally know of one serious injury that has occurred due to lack of concentration when manoeuvring a DCU. The following is the safe working procedure that was created after the event:
When positioning, re-positioning or removing a DCU from site it is critical that it is done so safely. DCUs are heavy pieces of plant. They can cause injury by trapping operatives against fixed structures and can become unstable if moved over rough ground.
Where necessary – a traffic marshal will use a barrier to stop traffic when the DCU is to be moved into the road to be hitched onto the waiting van.
It’s important to reiterate that the scope of the DCU guidance was limited to gas and electricity issues. As such, I know I’m being slightly unfair in expanding my analysis out to other issues such as personal safety and manual handling. However, both are important issues, and as we’re not likely to get more guidance on DCUs for the foreseeable future, this seems an ideal time to provide something comprehensive whilst the bonnet is up.
Written by Nick Garland on Thursday November 11th 2021
With the HSE’s electronic licence assessment process now nearly three years old, the original pilot companies are going through the process again. The promise for the new system was that licensed asbestos removal contractors (LARCs) would feel the pain only on their first time through, with all subsequent renewals being much more straightforward. Only time will tell whether the HSE’s view of simplicity matches ours.
But assuming the process has bedded down into an initial, intense assessment, followed by more of an ongoing ‘light touch’, what is certain is that the regulator will be focused on what’s new. This will range from any changes you have made internally, through the findings of any HSE visits, and crucially the results of your own audit programme.
And as anyone that’s been through the licence process will know, while the HSE values a well-managed internal audit programme, external audits are near-mandatory – and huge store is put on their findings.
First off, it’s important to explain that I’m a huge supporter of internal audits. Without looking for yourself, it is easy to fall into the trap of running your company with blinkers on. This wilful blindness will lead to poor practice through ignorance, and a degree of shock when others – such as the HSE – see something that you haven’t.
The key is that these internal audits need to be effective. Significant pitfalls to avoid would be:
The weaknesses in both come because it is human nature to see what you expect to see. If you always have the same auditor, they’ll always spot the things they’re great at spotting. The things they’re not so good at spotting will always get missed. When marking your own homework it is difficult to spot your own mistakes!
Contracts managers (CMs) who audit their own jobs will be particularly vulnerable to this. The takeaway is not necessarily to (as some would say) avoid CM auditors, it is rather to ensure that you’re aware of their limitations, and that you look for these in the results. Whether audits are conducted by a CM or a regular internal auditor, if they typically don’t find anything wrong, it’s unlikely to mean there isn’t anything to find. In fact, it should be seen as a warning. A blend of auditors makes for a healthy system. A LARC can benefit most from the eyes and interpretation of the CMs, the MD, and even supervisors themselves.
This last group is often underused for auditing, but while they don’t realise it, supervisors audit every job. Often they even record their findings – for example your supervisor’s pre-start check is an audit of the RAMS (risk assessment method statement) against the reality they are faced with.
It’s important to use this data, and so recording it needs to be easy. Assure360 is specifically designed to streamline all aspects of construction safety, so we allow supervisors to complete pre-start checks digitally – with the data automatically contributed to the internal audit system.
Assure360 also allows safety tours, so any time that the CM and MD complete a site visit they can record any issues they see. Again, this flexibility helps record and highlight issues that typically get resolved there and then, and would otherwise be forgotten by the time an audit rolls around. Finally – uniquely to Assure360 – we help avoid the ‘snow blindness’ sometimes caused by over-reliance on internal audits. All our users get to see benchmark data from the many thousands of audits already completed on the system – letting you learn from other people’s lessons.
External sets of eyes
It’s clear that a well-managed internal audit programme is crucial for health and safety. So what does an external expert add? Their key role is to provide a check and balance on your own observations – allowing you to recalibrate.
The HSE knows all too well the limitations of internal audits, and approaches them with a pinch of salt. For the purposes of licence assessment, it needs some sort of external verification of the evidence submitted. In the past this would have been HSE visits – and lots of them. But with budgets as they are, we’re not seeing the dramatic step up in inspections that would be needed. In fact the numbers are down again – continuing the trend of the last four years:
| HSE Annual Report 2017 / 2018 | HSE Annual Report 2019/2020 | HSE Annual Report 2020/2021 | |
| Asbestos visits | 1,000 | 900 | 860 |
| Inspectors | 1,066 | 1059 | 1045 |
| Proactive inspection visits | 20,000 | 13,300 | 14,880 |
To supplement its own visits, the HSE will therefore be focusing its attention on what other external eyes have spotted – and that means the finding of external auditors.
The first round of the new licence assessment required LARCs to submit three internal and three external audits conducted in the six months before application. With the HSE’s licence assessment now focused solely on what’s new and what’s changed, these audits will take centre stage.
All of which brings us back to a subject I wrote about earlier in the year – the increasing importance of the external auditor. In any healthy auditing ecosystem – and explicitly in the three-and-three minimum outlined by the HSE – the independent auditor presents a vital, fresh perspective on the otherwise closed feedback loop of internal audits.
Fundamentally, external auditors improve the overall quality of an audit system in multiple ways:
Independent audits should always be seen as a vital check, regardless of how we’re licensed, but the HSE’s increasing reliance on them may well be about to drive up demand as the industry begins its second rotation through the new system. To the handful of existing quality auditors, we need to add other skilled and experienced professionals, able to help protect and improve the safety standards to which we all aspire.
If you know my history, you’ll know this is an area I feel strongly about. Through Assure360 I’m determined to help improve auditing standards in our industry, which is why we’re continuing to offer Assure360 as a free-of-charge service to suitably qualified independent auditors. Whether or not the end client is using Assure360, this means the auditor will benefit from:
The system is even more appealing if the client happens to be an Assure360 customer. In these cases, all audits will automatically read across to the client’s slice of the system, allowing:
We’re keen to expand the group of selected, quality auditors who use Assure360 to simplify their audits, and improve the depth and clarity of their reporting. If you’re interested in joining them, why not get in touch to understand more about how Assure360 can support you?
“Assure 360 auditing software has made my auditing process seamless, and provides a quality audit for my clients in an easy-to-read format. The system is very stable. Nick and the team are on hand to provide support when required. It is very rare to find such experts in the field running and operating great software.”
Craig Ablett, Consulo Health & Safety Ltd
“I just find it so, so easy to use, so simple. It doesn’t take up half the time of my own audit system – where I’m uploading photos, copying and pasting information. It’s none of that, it’s quick. It’s a great app really.”
Chris Pedley, CP Safety
“It’s the benchmark we should all be working to. It covers just about everything you could want on an asbestos audit, along with general health and safety.”
Dave Philips, D&N Asbestos Advisory Services
“I’m an absolute fan. When I turn up on site, I’m not carrying pens, paper and clipboards. It’s just user friendly, it’s so easy.”
Paul Beaumont, BIACS
“My clients aren’t just getting a box-ticking exercise, they’re benefitting from my expertise and feedback, and the software’s ability to help produce actionable information.”
Chris Pedley, CP Safety
Written by Nick Garland on Wednesday February 10th 2021
The Covid pandemic is virtually unprecedented in living memory. And aside from the awful human cost, its impact on the economy will be felt for many years to come. As a health and safety consultant, I’m also fascinated by the challenges it has created around workplace safety, and the effect on employers, employees and the regulator as we all try to stay safe.
And what of the regulator? The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has been under enormous budgetary pressure for many years. And over the long months of the pandemic, I’ve become increasingly concerned that its lack of resources is hampering its ability to enforce Covid-safe working conditions.
Let’s begin by looking at how the HSE’s budgetary challenges were already impacting its operations before Covid. Looking at the data from the 2017-18 and 2019-20 annual reports, we can see the following:
| HSE Annual Report
2017 / 2018 |
HSE Annual Report
2019/2020 |
|
| Proactive inspection visits | 20,000 | 13,300 |
| Prosecutions | Not reported | 355 |
| INs | Not reported | 5,000 |
| PNs | Not reported | 1,900 |
| Asbestos visits | 1,000 | 900 |
| Inspectors | 1,058 | 1,059 |
| Prosecutions | 509 | 355 |
| Construction fatalities | 30 | 40 |
While the number of inspectors didn’t drop between reports, site visits did very markedly. Even the HSE’s attendance on asbestos sites fell by 10%. In the same period, prosecutions were down by 30%, and construction fatalities climbed by a third.
The tail end of this reporting period also saw the emergence and spread of Covid-19. The HSE recently told the Guardian that it had made 32,000 site visits during the pandemic. Meanwhile, the HSE’s Coronavirus management information dashboard provides this monthly breakdown of covid case notifications throughout 2020-21:
If these figures are accurate, they represent a massive surge in activity for an already overstretched body. Despite the recent trend of falling attendance on site and a reduction in prosecutions, there has now been a huge increase in numbers of unannounced visits. But is it having the desired effect?
Nationally we have seen very worrying increases in the infection rate during the most recent wave of the pandemic, and data from PHE suggests that some of this is coming from workplaces.
The latest Public Health England surveillance data suggests workplace infections surged as people returned to work in January. The number of coronavirus outbreaks in workplaces rose by almost 70% in the first week of the national lockdown, with 175 Covid case clusters reported in English workplaces
The Guardian 16th January 2021
Before continuing, I wanted to provide a short reminder of the levers that the HSE has available when it comes to enforcement. As a starting point, it can issue verbal and written instruction or guidance, which can be as simple as a chat or email from the inspector.
Certainly within the licensed asbestos removal industry, these basic measures have some real weight. If you don’t act effectively on instruction or guidance there can be dire consequences during licence renewal. However, in other less heavily regulated industries I’m not sure whether they provide quite the same imperative to act.
The HSE’s next level of action is quite a big step up. Improvement Notices (IN) give detailed instructions on what improvements you need to make, and by when. They can be appealed, but unless that’s successful you will need to act.
Next come Prohibition Notices (PN), which are very severe – and often also lead to prosecution. A PN essentially stops a certain activity immediately. Again, you can appeal, but the stoppage still kicks in with immediate effect. PNs can be wide-ranging and major: they can shut down an entire construction site or factory.
So, has the surge in HSE visits to companies translated into more of these enforcement actions? Recent news articles would suggest not. According to a January 2021 analysis by the Observer, the HSE had been contacted nearly 97,000 times on Covid-related workplace safety issues – including 2,945 times between 6 and 14 January alone. The newspaper found that overall, just 0.1% of these Covid safety cases received an IN or PN. A simple calculation suggests that’s roughly 97 Covid-related enforcements throughout the pandemic.
A January BBC News article quoted slightly higher figures for complaints during the same 6-14 January period, and suggested significantly higher levels of enforcement. In that week, it says the HSE received 3,934 coronavirus-related complaints, and took action in 81 cases. However, it notes that only one company faced more than a verbal or written warning.
A brief look at the enforcement action register suggests that the number of enforcement notices might even be lower than these headline figures. I found eight PNs where the only reason COVID was mentioned was as a justification as to why another misdemeanor was hard to close out. A similar investigation into the INs might show up similar cases.
Further analysis shows another interesting trend – Covid-related enforcements seem to centre on companies in the construction sector. Of the nine remaining PNs I found, five went to just two companies. Of the six companies found at fault, all but one were in the construction sector – and the inspectors’ comments seem to focus on washing facilities.
This seems out of step with reality when, as the BBC notes, the 500 confirmed or suspected office outbreaks in the second half of 2020 were more than those centered on supermarkets, construction sites, warehouses, restaurants and cafes combined. So why were no PNs issued here?
As others have noted, while workplace safety enforcement in the UK as a whole relies on the Health and Safety at Work Act (HASAWA), Scotland has legally obligated employers to ensure their employees can work from home wherever possible. But is this the most sensible health and safety advice?
HASAWA should give ample powers to the regulators. Since 1974, employers must assess the risks at work and reduce them so far as reasonably practicable. And if they don’t there is the big stick of enforcement action and prosecution. Many of the examples given in the articles above appear to be pretty flagrant breaches.
However, home working or furloughing staff might add financial burdens that are the final straw for a company’s survival. And therein lies the balancing act for an employer. I can imagine situations where, in the face of practical and financial challenges from sending people home, a diligent employer is instead able to make the workplace covid secure. The flexibility of HASAWA allows this to happen. If home working was an employee’s right, imaginative and effective solutions might not exist, and some companies may not survive.
Obviously, where it’s reasonably practicable, the goal should be to eliminate the risk. In the case of Covid-19:
Elimination may be impossible, or very burdensome, whereas mitigation may bring the risk down to a low enough level for people to remain in the workplace.
Despite this, in many cases cited by journalists it looks like little or no effort has been made. Interviewees speak of working side by side in warehouses, or conducting telephone sales and administration in a very small or poorly ventilated office.
The law is simple: if a company has not done enough to mitigate or eliminate a risk, then they are liable for serious punishment. But only if they get caught. With 33,000 visits, it’s clear that the HSE is making serious efforts to enforce safety during Covid. But with only approximately 80 INs and nine PNs, the evidence suggests that its approach to enforcement might be very light-touch.
An example contained in a second BBC article hints at where we might be going wrong on workplace Covid safety. A member of the public alleges that he works among 30 people on one floor of his employer’s office, that the windows are always closed, and – unbelievably – that they still hot-desk. With five or six covid cases apparently linked to the firm, it seems a clear example of a company not doing enough, or at least taking actions that are demonstrably not working.
The firm states in its defence: “We have worked closely with Public Health England since the start of the pandemic to implement extensive safety measures in line with government advice.”
And for me, that’s the heart of the issue.
During the pandemic, companies are looking to the guidance and – in far too many cases – scratching their heads on how they follow it and still make a profit. What they’re not doing is following the principle on which the HASAWA is built: looking at their underlying duties, and ensuring they take effective and specific actions to deliver a safe workplace.
An employer is compelled by law to ensure that its place of work is as safe as possible. The government also provides helpful advice (guidance) on how employers can fulfill this legal duty. How you go about making your workplace safe is, to some extent, up to you. You can follow the guidance, or craft something else – but the immutable fact remains that your legal duty is to make it safe.
My fear is that the HSE’s approach may be permitting a culture in which companies can point to generic guidance, in place of implementing specific measures that keep their employees most safe in their specific workplace. The HASAWA is beautifully crafted to get the extra mile out of employers – but if there is no enforcement, then an important pillar is missing, and the whole church is at risk of falling down.
Written by Nick Garland on Thursday December 10th 2020
Who would have thought that a virtual conference could keep you glued to your seat? If I’m honest, not me. Times are busy for us at Assure360, and so when I looked at the programme for the BOHS/FAAM conference there were a few slots where I thought “I might be able to miss that.” More fool me – the two days were absolutely riveting.
So here’s my attempt to sum up a few of the highlights from the conference. I haven’t included all the sessions, but if you’re a FAAM member I think the plan is for you to be able to log in and browse them all.
The control limit
The conference got underway with a history lesson, but one that really set up so much else for the two days. The Health and Safety Executive (HSE)’s Sam Lord took us on an interesting journey through how we arrived at the current asbestos control limit. She even explained the logic behind the name, and the important shift in thinking that it represented: that is, that there is no ‘safe’ limit.
Sam went on to give us an update on the HSE’s new Analysts’ Guide, which does finally seem to be nearing release next year. The guidance will contain two changes to the air testing criteria which I think are brilliant.
The first is that the UK will come in line with the World Health Organisation (WHO) method for sampling against the control limit. The four-hour time weighted average (4hr TWA) test has always been very challenging – not least because many tasks (when you take off breaks and decontamination) are not four hours long. But whilst they are difficult, these are legally mandatory duty-of-care tests.
The new guidance introduces important flexibility in the pump flow rate:
| Application | Sampling rate (l/min) | Min air volume 25mm ⌀ filter (litres) | Minimum number of graticule areas to be examined | Calculated airborne concentration at the LOQ |
| 4-hour control limit | 1-2* | 240 | 100 | 0.04 |
| 10-minute short-term exposure limit | 4 | 40 | 100 | 0.24 |
| Specific short-duration activities | 4 | 120 | 100 | 0.08 |
| Assessment of suitability of RPE | >0.2-4 | 40 | 100 | 0.24 |
* Note the change from 1 to ‘1-2’. This allows for higher volume tests in a shorter period.
** Brand new test – see below
Sam’s talk linked nicely with a presentation by Dan Barrowcliffe on the second day, about personal monitoring. I was able to catch up with Dan after the conference for some more thrilling personal monitoring chat (I appreciate perhaps not everyone shares my enthusiasm).
He and I discussed how the minimum volume column is important. For a 4hr TWA test this volume is 240 litres, which means you need to run the pump for between two and four hours. If you’re running it for two hours, where do the other two hours of a 4hr TWA come from?
If you have good enough data, based on accurate personal monitoring, you can interpolate them from your anticipated values. This opens up exciting potential for Assure360 users, as with 18,000+ personals already in the system we can potentially convert an awful lot more tests into the difficult-to-achieve standard. Watch this space – we will have a new report to do just this in the new year.
Short-duration activities
The other crucial change to the guidance – and something I’ve been calling for for years – is the new ‘Specific short-duration activities’ test. This is essentially what a well run, competent LARC does all of the time: test the peak high fibre release activities to measure the effectiveness of their methods.
Now that it is in the guide, analysts will know what parameters to test against, finally allowing LARCs to do their job properly. I personally would like a little more flexibility (a flow rate of 2-4, rather than 4), but now I’m being picky.
At the end of day one, Dan did an updated review of his four-stage clearance (4SC) project (see my summary of the preliminary findings here), and how it has influenced the new analyst guide. The project showed some encouraging improvements in analyst behaviour and performance on site. One of the main points however, is the application of a hard limit of 10 minutes on how much cleaning can be done within the 4SC. Equally importantly, this shouldn’t be done by the analyst at all. This change should bring an end to nightmare jobs where a hoard of operatives are trying to clean in the enclosure during the inspection itself.
The day of the trial
Day two started with an innovative mock trial, which moved from fascinating to excruciating as we watched the full horror unfold. The ‘case’ examined what could happen when an organisation that thinks it’s on top of asbestos policy discovers the hard way that it hasn’t been. The actors were all asbestos professionals – and somehow were able to tone down their knowledge levels to stay in character. I still don’t know how they did it, but it was absolutely enthralling.
The afternoon focused on asbestos technology. I found it all very interesting, particularly when learning about Hysurv’s use of drones to conduct visual surveys of buildings. I was lining up plenty of ‘well, it won’t work because…’ and ‘all very well, but what about…’ comments, only to find them comprehensively eliminated by their capabilities. One highlight was watching a drone fly through a tangled ceiling void!
The ability to survey a roof in vivid detail, showing the precise location and accurate measurements of presumed asbestos materials, was incredible. The equipment also seemed well capable of surveying confined and restricted-access spaces – potentially improving safety and raising surveying standards in the most challenging jobs.
So, far from skipping sessions I found myself largely glued to my screen for the full two-day programme. If virtual conferences are the shape of things to come – and it looks like they might be for a few months yet – then consider me an enthusiastic convert.
Written by Nick Garland on Thursday December 10th 2020
Let’s be honest, nobody’s going to look back fondly on 2020. The arrival of Covid 19 and the ongoing pandemic has ruined plans, destroyed businesses – and sadly cost far too many lives. But while it’s been a challenging and sobering year, new vaccines promise better times ahead. And many of the changes forced on businesses will be the basis for better trading as we turn the corner.
The year everything changed
You can’t look back on 2020 without discussing Covid 19. Mushrooming from a small outbreak centered in Wuhan, China, to a global pandemic in just three months, the virus has left few aspects of our lives untouched. From the outset, the lockdowns necessary to control the disease’s spread created social, financial and emotional scars that may take years to heal.
For many businesses, it was quickly clear that the pandemic represented an existential challenge. We in the construction and asbestos-removal sectors have been luckier than some, with much of our work allowed for most of the year, but still these have been difficult times.
So far, so obvious, but for the rest of this post I want to focus as much as possible on the positives from this year – the new tools and solutions that have helped us carry on at the pandemic’s peak, and which will continue to make business better as we emerge.
A lucky break with tradition
In April we marked a year since the Health and Safety Executive (HSE)’s introduction of the new digital service for asbestos-removal licensing. Fraught with challenges – and, for a short time, horror stories – the long overdue overhaul had a difficult few months, but in retrospect it got here just in time.
By the time the pandemic hit, the HSE had ironed most of the creases out of its new system. The industry, too, had a better understanding of what the HSE expected – helped in part by innovations such as Assure360’s custom licensing module.
As inspectors were grounded under lockdown conditions, the move to digital assessments began to seem uncannily well-timed. Asbestos-removal contractors could renew their licenses and continue working, where otherwise they might have been dependent on inspector visits that couldn’t happen.
A new way to work
If 2020 is remembered for anything other than Covid, it will be as the year that accelerated digital transformation. Global businesses were already on the path, digitising existing processes and inventing new ways to work, but few smaller firms had been caught up in the wave. Covid changed that at a stroke – forcing even the smallest firms to embrace Zoom, cloud-working, and countless other digital tools.
For the asbestos removal industry, it’s a big change. We’ve been around for a while, and our highly regulated industry previously depended on meticulous paperwork. Assure360 has been selling the technology to change that for some years, but 2020 has seen a dramatic growth in interest, as more firms sought out ways to support socially-distanced working.
This is particularly true for Assure360 Paperless. Our digital supervisor support tool removes the site paperwork from asbestos projects. In itself, this cuts the amount of materials being passed around between workers, but during the pandemic another benefit grew in significance.
By automatically synchronising site data with our cloud-based system, Assure360 presents managers with reports and analysis based on the freshest data from the project. Many users have relied on this to reduce their visits to site, confident that Assure360 is providing the insight they need to manage jobs remotely.
Zoom spreads
As the year drew on, people began to use these new digital tools more extensively. In the asbestos industry, briefings and supervisor meetings started to happen over Zoom. In the wider world, recruitment and induction was increasingly carried out remotely – some people are still working from home in new jobs where they’re yet to meet their colleagues!
And as it became obvious that the usual round of conferences and seminars wouldn’t happen, organisations began to think about how they could deliver essential events virtually. ACAD switched its regional meetings to a virtual platform, for example, while we provided a webinar on Covid-safe working.
While the biggest events like the Hazardous Materials Expo have had to be cancelled altogether, academic conferences like BOHS and FAAM were able to go ahead online – to great effect.
As businesses, event and training providers all get greater experience with digital tools, it’s likely we’ll all continue to do things in new ways as the pandemic begins to recede. For example, several of our Paperless customers are planning to continue remote management, with fewer site visits. As Phil Neville of Asbestech pointed out, aside from helping greatly through the pandemic, our paperless technology has helped him reduce vehicle mileage in line with the firm’s ISO 14001 undertakings.
For events, digital access could help more delegates ‘attend’ even far-flung conferences. Next year’s iMig2021 – originally due to be held in Brisbane this year, then postponed to next March – will now take place virtually in May. While it’s a shame for people who would have made it to Australia, the pivot to a virtual setting means that far more people can now take part.
For many, 2020 has been a miserable year, and it may be a few months yet before things get better. 2021 begins with the end of the Brexit transition period and whatever fallout that brings, and it may be some months before the vaccination programme really bears fruit.
In the meantime, paperless and remote technology continues to help us navigate the pandemic, and promises to improve efficiency and create new possibilities in the future. After a difficult year, that’s a welcome source of hope as we go into 2021.
Written by Nick Garland on Tuesday March 10th 2020
We’ve long been admirers of the Asbestos Knowledge Empire – a series of podcasts run by Acorn Analytical Services’ Neil Munro and Ian Stone. Speaking to a cross section of health and safety and asbestos experts, the series is helping play an important role in spreading awareness and fostering asbestos expertise. So when Acorn asked if I’d like to participate I jumped at the chance.
In a wide-ranging hour-long chat, we covered subjects as diverse as how I got my start in the industry, the one-time ubiquity of asbestos, and the importance of analysts and removal contractors ‘wearing lots of hats’. We also talked in depth about the Health and Safety Executive’s new licensing regime, the problems it’s solved and the new challenges it’s created.
If you’re interested in what I had to say, or if you’d just like to hear from the industry’s other leading lights, head over to Asbestos Knowledge Empire. There you’ll be able to listen to the latest episode, and find links to follow the series on popular platforms including Apple Podcasts and Spotify.
I hope you enjoy listening as much as I enjoyed taking part!
Written by Nick Garland on Wednesday February 12th 2020
The Health and Safety at Work Act underpins everything we do in the asbestos sector, yet within it – and in copious Health and Safety Executive (HSE) guidance – you’ll find unnerving phrases like ‘so far as reasonably practicable’. These create room for interpretation, with the result that people can be unclear how far they should go when removing asbestos. Even the way that some of the direction is framed can lead us into tricky territory: I’ve lost track of the number of times I’ve been told ‘it’s only guidance’.
So after a recent thread on the HSE’s forum, I thought it would be worthwhile analysing how the regulations are structured, and what we should be doing when designing a job. Particularly, if ‘perfect’ isn’t possible, what do we prioritise?
First let’s look at the ideal conditions for asbestos removal. We have an enclosure that is small, but big enough to allow efficient and safe removal of the asbestos. The air in and out is sufficient and balanced. The enclosure is perfectly sealed, and it’s designed in such a way that there’s no working from height. The combination of method, suppression and local exhaust ventilation (LEV) ‘eliminates’ all fibre release at source.
Obviously it’s a rare job indeed where we can get all of our controls by-the-book, so often there’s a need to find compromise. First up, I should stress that compromise should only come with need – you can’t just miss out controls. Where there are good practical or safety reasons why a control isn’t possible, you need to design others to mitigate.
To track back and answer that common response when people depart from the direction, it is not ‘guidance’; it is ‘Guidance’. Project design should be in line with the ‘Guidance’, or be equivalent to or better than it.
The Health and Safety at Work Act is not a tick box set of regulations. It’s written with an understanding that no two jobs are identical, and is specifically designed to harness our imagination as professionals in ensuring safe working practice in all circumstances. To that end we need to really understand the hazards, the resultant risks, and the controls we implement to eliminate or minimise them.
We, as asbestos professionals, are also guilty of being rather blinkered. We’ve got our specialist subject, so asbestos risk is all too often the first and last thing we think about. But take a step back and reappraise our typical work environment: while asbestos is complex, many other risks such as height or electricity pose a more immediate threat. In other words, we have to think of the whole project.
The particular example raised in the HSE forum was a small-to-medium metal frame shed with an asbestos insulating board (AIB) ceiling, and asbestos cement roof. Roof, frame and AIB were pinned together with J-bolts, and the building was in close proximity to neighbours.
The conundrum posed was whether you would build a full enclosure – with the high cost and the risk from crosswinds – or crop the bolts and remove the cement and AIB at the same time with no enclosure, but with perimeter air monitoring. Because of the breakage, removal of the AIB alone was discounted as an option.
Consider the first option. A full scaffold enclosure would create a rather large working at height issue. Just constructing the canopy has a risk, but then sheeting internal ranch-boards would involve working above a fragile roof. This risk is difficult to control and can have an immediately fatal consequence. And if the winds get up, it could all be for nought.
My argument is that the overall risk is lower if we build the enclosure internally, and control the increased asbestos risk that we create. Controls in this case should include strongly over-specifying the negative pressure ventilation (or over-neg if you’re in the industry) . The considerable breakage of AIBs needs to be mitigated with surfactant, shadow vacuuming and increased respiratory protective equipment (RPE) provision, for example air-fed RAS masks. As Paul Beaumont pointed out, there would be the potential of AIB fibre / fragments to become trapped within the corrugated sheeting, too.
The four-stage safety clearance certificate would identify this likely residual risk, mandating further controls when removing the cement sheets. As this is now a small asbestos risk, we may be able to approach the remaining stages of the project with a roofless enclosure, bringing the cement sheets down into the building.
This example distills a common problem, where we are faced with a choice between one or more risks that are potentially controllable, or another that is very difficult to control. I would go with the former – and this extends into all other areas of asbestos removal where we are too used to controlling the asbestos risk at the expense of ignoring or exacerbating others.
There are other examples. A classic is working in a loft in the summer. The new confined space guidance makes it clear that the heat makes this a confined space, yet often what I see when auditing is a cube at the bottom of the loft access, a three-stage air lock, and a negative-pressure unit (NPU) with roving head passed up through the single access point. This gives excellent control of the small AIB debris risk, but massively increases the risk of death from heatstroke.
What to do instead? You won’t find it in the books, so again it’s down to our professional creativity. Why not dispense with the roving head, harness the natural leakage of the tiled roof and over-neg the enclosure? Even in winter, this might be a good idea as the common setup would hinder an emergency evacuation, for example if there’s a fire in the building.
My argument is that the asbestos risk is complex and difficult to control, but we can’t let it blind us to the rest of the job. It must be properly balanced against the other risks of the working environment: addressing one risk in isolation may leave the site team in danger, or raise their overall risk. Training and refreshers for managers should therefore cover all construction hazards and how to control them. It’s important to remember this at the time of auditing or assessing performance: peer reviews must look at all hazards, rather than just how well the manager has dealt with the asbestos.
Indeed, if asbestos is the only hazard that a contracts manager understands, are they truly ‘competent’? I’m sure that being ignorant of other construction hazards would not be seen as a defence.
As professionals we are responsible for looking at the whole project, and balancing the hazards and risks against each other. Our controls should then be crafted to mitigate all of them. Some controls may elevate the risk from other hazards, which then have to be looked at again. Designing safe working environments and procedures requires the application of knowledge, experience, and imagination. As no two jobs are the same, the latter is not only crucial – but demanded by the Health and Safety at Work Act.
Written by Nick Garland on Thursday January 16th 2020
We all know that the job of asbestos removal is dangerous – that’s why it’s so tightly regulated. But while the most serious risks are often found inside the enclosure, they don’t stop there. The decontamination unit (DCU) presents its own hazards – from asbestos exposure, through electrical and gas hazards, to crush injury when setting up or decamping. So what guidance is available, and how can it help keep operatives safe?
Last year the Asbestos Leadership Council (ALC) made time in several meetings to discuss DCU safety. Unfortunately they’ve made slow progress in producing guidance, and the final version hasn’t been issued. That said, I wanted to take a look at what there is so far, as it’s good stuff. The focus is on electrical and gas safety, which is particularly welcome – working practice in much of the industry is still based on very outdated facts and guidance.
I’m also adding in some additional observations based on my experience of the biggest hazards, and the safe working practices designed to mitigate them.
The guidance starts predictably enough, instructing that gas boilers should meet the required BS EN standards, that they should be installed by an accredited gas fitter, and that each appliance should be fitted with an isolating valve and flame failure device. However, it then goes on to say that all boilers situated in the clean end – rather than a sealed cupboard – should be of the balanced flue type .
For those of us who aren’t gas engineers, in a balanced flue (also known as room-sealed) boiler, the entire combustion circuit is sealed off from the room that the boiler’s in. The fresh air supply, combustion chamber, heat exchanger and exhaust gases are open to the atmosphere only, meaning that if something goes wrong, any toxic or flammable gases should be vented out of the DCU.
Insisting on this type is wise, as they’re much safer than open flue boilers which draw their combustion air from the room they’re in, but following the guidelines might mean an expensive upgrade for any older DCUs.
There are some other issues to pick up on. If the boiler is mounted in a separate sealed cupboard it is best practice for that boiler to be room-sealed anyway, but regardless the cupboard door must be closed and sealed at all times. Many times I’ve seen cupboard doors left open, sometimes for convenience, but sometimes because there is otherwise insufficient ventilation in the cupboard for the boiler to work. If the boiler only works when you leave the cupboard door open, then it’s effectively in the clean end, and must be room-sealed.
It’s important to understand that a room-sealed boiler doesn’t guarantee that combustion products like carbon monoxide (CO) can’t leak into the room. Seals can fail, so there should always be a CO alarm fitted in the clean end, adjacent to the vent to the shower compartment. Correct positioning is important – I’ve seen random locations, not all of which will be effective according to the guidance.
The guidance here pretty much summarises existing standard guidance. In brief, the gas bottle(s) should be:
Note, too, that there should be a maximum of two 16kg bottles, and that nothing spark-generating should be stored with them.
So far, so standard, but then we get to areas where I’m not sure we have much compliance. Gas bottles should be:
There’s some welcome clarity here: DCUs require mandatory 12-monthly gas-safety certificates. Some HSE inspectors are still referring to a very old note that mandated six-monthly inspections for open-flued units. This detailed guidance supersedes and clarifies this.
In day-to-day use, the gas pipework needs to be checked daily and at the end of the project – not a job that I’ve seen on many supervisor checklists. There should also be emergency procedures to follow if gas is smelled. The advice states that gas should be isolated at the end of the shift, but it then goes on to contradict itself, suggesting that if there’s no oil-filled radiator the pilot light should be left running in cold weather. Presumably this will be cleared up in the final pre-publication checks.
All vents, clearly, need to be kept clear. If you have an open-flue boiler in a sealed cupboard, that cupboard needs to be kept closed and the seals must be in good condition. In all cases the CO alarm must be checked at least weekly.
This is usually the area that gets the most attention when a job is audited, but the justification for this seems patchy at best. To my knowledge there has never been a DCU electrocution, so the previous guidance has clearly been serving us well.
This guidance states that all DCUs must regularly be electrically inspected and tested – we rarely see units that haven’t been. In fact, the biggest risk is likely to come from using the client’s mains supply if it turns out to be faulty. The moment of greatest risk is brief – when an individual is standing on the floor, but touching the metal frame of the DCU.
The guidance offers some pointers on how to eliminate electrocution risks:
However the guidance really calls for better design of DCUs to ensure better electrical separation, along the lines of a bathroom. Generally there should be layers of insulation between electricity and people, and the power for recharging masks should come from two-pin, low-voltage sockets. Where there are concerns about the quality of the source electrical supply, it’s perhaps wisest to use a single-phase generator rated below 10kVA, which doesn’t need earthing at all.
The ALC’s guidance may be useful and comprehensive, but it overlooks the most pressing DCU safety issue: the risks relating to manual handling and vehicle movements when positioning them. DCUs are heavy beasts, and it typically takes more than one person to maneuver them by hand. It takes coordination and well-designed procedures to prevent workers being trapped or injured, yet it’s all too often overlooked.
I personally know of one serious injury that has occured due to lack of concentration when maneuvering a DCU. The following is the safe working procedure that was created after the event:
When positioning, re-positioning or removing a DCU from site it is critical that it is done so safely. DCUs are heavy pieces of plant. They can cause injury by trapping operatives against fixed structures, and can become unstable if moved over rough ground.
Where necessary – a traffic marshal will use a barrier to stop traffic when the DCU is to be moved into the road to be hitched onto the waiting van.
It’s a shame that the ALC’s guidance overlooks the risks from positioning the DCU, but apart from that it does help clarify what’s necessary to ensure safety as operatives finish shifts. Well-trained staff should already understand that the risks of asbestos removal don’t end until they’ve decontaminated and exited the DCU (and beyond) – following this guidance should help ensure they stay safe while they do so.
Written by Nick Garland on Wednesday September 18th 2019
Over the summer it’s become clear that the Health and Safety Executive’s new asbestos licensing regime is, to put it mildly, challenging. With a switch in emphasis from interview to written evidence, the HSE has moved more of the burden of the licence application onto the companies applying. At the same time, the free-form way in which would-be LARCs can submit their evidence means that the HSE faces an increased and inconsistent workload.
So, for those seeking an asbestos-removal licence under the new scheme, the best advice I can give is to start now. The new process is incredibly time-consuming, labour-intensive and confusing, and to date there has been limited guidance on what and how much you should write. The application form has 14 sections, all of which require you to explain and provide evidence for how you comply with or exceed the HSE’s expectations. This can mean gathering, scanning and emailing off dozens of pieces of paper, but early applicants have complained that the email size limit has been set too low.
Because everyone is providing different evidence, in different ways, in different formats, it’s taking the HSE months to analyse the returns before the Asbestos Licensing Unit (ALU) makes a formal decision. All this delay is taking some decisions right to the wire, with licences coming through just in time – or too late.
It’s hard to overstate the frustration and stress this is causing, so start early when applying. Have all of your documents ready, know what you are going to provide, and organise yourself with folders for every section of the application form. Apply and pay the invoice at the earliest possible moment – and then monitor the HSE like a hawk until you have the licence in your hand.
But simply acting in good time and having your evidence prepared will only get you so far. With applications still very confusing, asbestos-removal contractors need smart ways to avoid the pitfalls, making the process smoother and simplifying the HSE’s task. That’s where Assure360 comes in: a suite of web services and apps integrated with a secure cloud database, our platform is the perfect tool for demonstrating your effective management of health and safety.
Several Assure360 features give its users a critical advantage in the licence application process. Designed from the ground up to support team working, it ensures that everyone participates in health and safety. Supervisors, contract managers and auditors audit, operatives contribute accident and near-miss information, and senior managers can use it all as the basis for sensible decisions.
Within Assure360, everything is simplified and streamlined. Our secure cloud approach means that everything can be accessed anywhere, by any member of the team, meaning you can enlist additional help when needed. With the powerful workflow feature, you can involve the full team in designing and closing out preventative actions, assigning and re-assigning tasks as you need to.
Assure360’s unique benchmarking reports also allow you to draw on the experience of the rest of the industry. We’re four years into the Assure360 project, and with more than 50 LARCs using the solution we’ve recorded nearly 8,000 audits and an astonishing 21,000 personal monitoring tests. This growing library of observations and the lessons learned are increasingly used to help inform your decisions.
All of these features are brilliant in themselves, but they’re particularly powerful when it comes to the licence application. Aside from demonstrating a deep and effective prioritisation of health and safety throughout your business, Assure360 feels like it was tailor made for the new licensing regime: all of the evidence for the complex application can be produced at the touch of a button.
In fact, we’ve even added a dedicated module to guide you through the process. For existing users here’s a link.This will guides you through section by section – with explanations and links to the areas of the system and reports that will help. There’s no more searching for the evidence – it’s all in one place. And because the HSE is very familiar with Assure360, having been through dozens of assessments already, its reports and data are instantly recognisable to those managing the applications, helping smooth the way through the process.
On top of this, Assure360 lets you grant the HSE direct access to your live data. Instead of sending dozens of printed reports, you can simply share links, allowing you to take the HSE on a journey demonstrating interconnected and layered health and safety management.
I’m not a software designer. I’m a health and safety professional, specialising in asbestos. I started in the industry in 1992, and have worked as an analyst surveyor and an embedded health and safety manager. Since then I’ve designed and implemented audit systems, trend analysis, competence systems and personal monitoring analysis for companies around the country.
Assure360 is the culmination of all the lessons I’ve learned. It helps reveal what your data has to tell you about your business. And when it comes to your licence application, it helps demonstrate to the HSE the professionalism and competency of what you do. For those fearing the chaos of licence renewal, it’s the perfect answer.
Written by Nick Garland on Monday June 24th 2019
The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) is in the middle of one of the biggest shakeups of asbestos licensing since the permissioning regime was introduced. I’ve already written about what’s changing, but I want to expand more on how Assure360 is better placed than ever to help customers through the whole licence application process.
The new electronic system of asbestos licence assessments is well into its trial, with multiple organisations already having experienced it. The whole process is radically different for applicants, with much more emphasis being placed on a review of the application and its supporting evidence than on the meeting itself.
When I first heard of the change I was very sceptical – and I know some HSE inspectors have had their doubts. There are obvious advantages to testing the mettle of a potential licensee whilst the asbestos licensing principle inspector (ALPI) looks them in the eye. But there have long been concerns over consistency in the current system, with some areas reputed to be much more rigorous than others. In the new regime, assessments are triaged by a central team, which should help in this regard.
The focus is now on providing evidence to support a licence application and, as at least one HSE inspector has observed, Assure360’s entire premise is to provide information to support sensible decisions. Its power is made even clearer with the new regime. The ability of Assure360 to support the bid – whether at the basic Silver or the fuller Gold and Platinum levels – is clear.
So what can you expect from the new application form? Here’s a brief overview of each section, with an explanation of how Assure360 can help both with your approach, and with providing the evidence that the HSE expects to see. It’s worth noting that the form comes with dire warnings to anyone tempted to use a consultant to complete it: there are grave consequences, potentially including licence revocation.
The first few sections of the application form are fairly broad, asking for details on who will be in the meeting and other key individuals who aren’t going to be present. It also asks what sources of information, legislation and literature you rely on. There are no ‘correct’ answers for any of these – they establish who the controlling minds are in your business, and how you stay abreast of changes and improvements in the industry.
So what helps here? Being a member of a trade organisation helps demonstrate a commitment to higher standards, while attending regional meetings can be an excellent opportunity to share experiences with like-minded professionals. I give out updates via my monthly newsletter (if you haven’t signed up – add your email at the bottom of this page). I also publish safety alerts.
By section four, the application form really starts to test your competence as an organisation by looking at plans of work. The HSE specifically asks for two different examples, and states that they should relate to jobs that you do.
What the form doesn’t say explicitly is that despite it being only two, they should cover all of the different types of job that you do. For example, if you have completed 100 asbestos insulating board (AIB) jobs and one pipe insulation removal, don’t submit two AIB jobs. What you do if your work extends beyond two types of job isn’t entirely clear.
After Section four, Assure360 becomes invaluable in your efforts to demonstrate and evidence your competence as a licensed contractor. Without it you’ll be scrabbling around for paper evidence, but with it, everything is at your fingertips. It’s up to you how you submit evidence, either printing it off or giving the HSE a read-only link to the correct page of the system. There is even a page dedicated to the licence application, in which we’ve mapped out the correct reports against each section in the application form.
These sections are all about site and equipment checks. Ordinarily you’d provide the site files – coffee stains, spelling mistakes and all, and you’d need to scan every page and save them as PDFs. A potential pitfall is the size limit on emails you can send to the HSE. The form states a maximum 25MB, but the real limit seems to vary – with some people reporting less than 12MB.
However, with Assure360 Paperless all of the plant, equipment and site checks are at your fingertips, and you can show them to the HSE. A few clicks will allow inspectors to see absolutely all the relevant checks completed on a site. The feature isn’t just restricted to plant and equipment – it covers enclosure checks and smoke tests too. All certificates completed in the Paperless app are uploaded directly to the project file and are time and date stamped. The App even helps with spelling.
Section seven deals with respiratory protective equipment (RPE), personal protective equipment (PPE) and air monitoring. Understanding and recording this has always been a problem for the industry, but it was one of the first things that Assure360 cracked.
Within two minutes, Assure360 users can provide detailed evidence of:
Just imagine trying to explain all of that with only an Excel spreadsheet!
This section covers health records and medicals. It’s an area that we don’t yet cover, but Assure360 is developing all of the time. Coming soon there will be a full personnel management system, which will be free to all subscribers.
These sections cover leadership and management – often difficult concepts to get your head around, never mind explain in writing. Again, Assure360 is there to provide evidence to backup your words. At the touch of a button you can display exactly what you are observing on site. You can show all of the non-conformances from all of your audits, including what you did to rectify on site and, critically, what you did to ensure they wouldn’t happen again.
With Assure360’s unique benchmark tool you can also spot what the entire army of Assure360 auditors are encountering, across the country. Being forewarned of developing problems allows you to plan to avoid issues and mitigate risk. This constitutes evidence of a proactive approach to health and safety management, and demonstrates your ability to look beyond just your company. Remember that this links in with one of the questions in the form’s early sections, on how you get your health and safety information.
Using Assure360 you can illustrate how many times your contract managers, senior management and even directors attend site. It’s seconds’ work to present the data in a colourful chart showing how many audits the entire team are doing, and providing direct evidence of senior management’s attendance on site and involvement in health and safety.
The final benefit is that you can remap all of the above information to reflect training needs for the individuals across your business. More on that in the next section.
Section 11 is all about training and competence. Assure360 is built around effective auditing, and the first thing we made the data do was drive competence. Providing evidence for all your assessments and training needs analysis is extremely straightforward. Within minutes you can present:
With Assure360 you can present a competence scheme that encompasses everyone in the organisation – not just supervisors and operatives. It is so comprehensive that it exceeds the HSE’s expectations.
The final section focuses on reviewing and measuring performance. As I said, auditing is the emotional home of Assure360. Auditing with the system saves about two hours compared to the traditional paper and Excel route. Add to this the fact that the database automatically interprets and re-interprets all of the observations and it’s the health and safety manager’s dream.
When it comes to the new licence assessment system, this section represents exactly what Assure360 was designed for:
Trend analysis – company as a whole, individuals, specific competencies and non conformances
Setting health and safety targets – you can move beyond the standard ‘no RIDDOR’ and ‘no enforcement action’ to set imaginative targets and evidence trends in performance at the individual level
What’s your strategy and are you hitting it? – evidence your success through simple one-click reports
This section also covers personal monitoring, through direct assessment of the method. Assure360’s personal monitoring module can be harnessed to show how you assess every aspect of each project. Users can generate reports to show only the personals that exceeded what was expected, along with links to reveal what was done about it, the assessed root cause, and any supporting evidence.
The HSE is still testing its new licence regime, with current developments officially regarded as a pilot scheme. Doubtless the system will be revised and refined before going ‘final’, but for LARCs renewing their licence it already requires a new approach.
For companies struggling with old, paper-based systems, the licencing regime’s increased focus on excellent record keeping, analysis and management competence is a challenge. However, Assure360 customers not only have the best tool for managing all aspects of asbestos removal, but the best tool for documenting, analysing and demonstrating their competence at doing so.
Written by Nick Garland on Thursday June 13th 2019
For some years, there’s been a question mark hanging over the Health and Safety Executive’s licensing regime for asbestos removal. With variable licence periods creating confusion among clients and an unintended hierarchy being created within the industry, attempts to overhaul the system are to be welcomed by everyone.
For those who don’t know, the existing system is a permissioning regime. Would-be licenced asbestos-removal contractors (LARCs) and those who want to renew must demonstrate to the HSE that they have the necessary skills, competency, expertise, knowledge and experience of work with asbestos, together with excellent health and safety management systems. The outcome is either no licence, a three-year licence, or any period between. Additional conditions are sometimes attached.
It sounds simple enough, but there are multiple problems. While nobody is meant to infer anything about competency from a company’s licence term, in practice customers choosing a LARC often treat the full three-year licence as a prerequisite. In addition, LARCs can’t notify a project that extends beyond their licence period – that means that bidding for complex, two-year-plus jobs is effectively restricted to the 35% or so of LARCs with a three-year licence.
Against this, in recent years the HSE has been less inclined to give out three-year licences. Among other things, that’s resulted in an increased workload for inspectors as they conduct more regular licence inspections. There’s a burden for LARCs, too, as there’s a considerable cost and administrative overhead to each licence application.
It’s no surprise that the HSE wants to shake things up. It’s already started to pilot a new regime that shifts the onus away from licence inspections, and more onto LARCs to provide evidence of their competency. In the new system, first-time applicants still get inspected, whereas existing LARCs re-apply via an electronic form.
A couple of years ago I called for an end to the fixed-term licence, and the introduction of monitoring visits. Essentially if you’re good enough, you get a licence. If not – you don’t. it’s recently emerged that in the pilot scheme the HSE are moving towards just that. As ACAD’s Graham Warren explains in a LinkedIn blog post:
“Some eagle-eyed people have been asking ACAD why all renewals [under the electronic pilot scheme] seem to be issued the full three-year term. HSE have confirmed this is not some chance occurrence, but actually how the new system works.”
At renewal, companies either won’t get a licence, or they’ll be licenced for the now-standard three-years. This doesn’t necessarily mean that LARCs that would previously have received a one or two-year licence will be turned down. In all cases where a company is judged competent, the HSE will issue a three-year licence, but it may require a formal review to ensure any improvements are fully implemented. Crucially, this review period will remain confidential, unless the LARC fails to make the required improvements, so it won’t affect the LARC’s ability to compete for contracts.
The change is virtually what I called for, and it’s a vast improvement. By settling on a single, three-year period, the HSE will reduce the confusion among clients who see one and two year licences as less of a vote of confidence. Moving the major work of re-licencing onto a three-year cycle will reduce the burden for LARCs, allowing them to concentrate on making the improvements the HSE wants to see at the review meeting.
For the HSE, it means less licence inspection work, and a relief from the commercial pressures to grant three-year licences to the biggest contractors, who may previously have needed them to bid for the most complex works. A more centralised approach by the HSE (all applications are reviewed by a single team) will mean much more consistency, too.
As Graham points out in his post, there may be some interesting consequences. With clients no longer able to select LARCs by licence duration, they’re likely to look for other ways to determine which companies are working to deliver the highest standards. Being able to demonstrate fastidious record keeping, management and analysis – for example through membership of a trade body such as ACAD – will become more of a competitive edge.
Assure360 can really help here, too. Our data-based system makes it easier not only for LARCs to manage asbestos removal, but for them to demonstrate the high quality of their training, competency, and analysis of key safety factors such as exposure monitoring.
In fact the new regime fits seamlessly with the Assure360 ethos. Being a health and safety system, specifically designed by asbestos industry experts for the asbestos industry, Assure360 has always allowed you to showcase your expertise. Vast quantities of evidence are now required in advance of the licence assessment, and Assure360 customers can simply provide it by running a series of reports. The database presents all the proof that the HSE could ever ask for. And with the new Paperless solution, even site files can be viewed with real date and time stamps on the certification.
We’ve got a great track record of helping clients prepare for, and excel at licence renewal: under the existing scheme our customers have consistently proven far more likely to achieve three-year licences. Under the new regime Assure360 will streamline the process even further, as our reports are mapped against the questions the HSE are asking.
So if you’re applying for a first-time licence, or preparing to renew an existing one, why not get in touch and see how we can help?
Assure360 will be at the Contamination Expo on the 11th and 12th of September – stand J7, directly opposite ACAD. So if you’re looking for guidance and insight into the new process, pitfalls to avoid and strategies to help – there couldn’t be a better first port of call.
I will also be speaking on the first day – 12:30 – 13:00 at Theatre 21 The subject – you guessed it is the only one that matters right now, the New Asbestos Licencing system and how electronic solutions can help.
Written by Nick Garland on Wednesday May 29th 2019
We’re not alone in having wondered whether the HSE’s asbestos licensing system was entirely fit for purpose. With three possible licence durations and multiple conditions that can be attached, clients often use a LARC’s licence as a shortcut to judging competence. Re-inspection as frequently as every year creates lots of work, both for the LARC and the HSE, and doesn’t necessarily result in raised standards.
A couple of years ago, founder Nick Garland called on the HSE to settle on a standard three-year licence, backed up with formal reviews. It’s recently emerged that’s exactly what’s happening in the HSE’s electronic licensing pilot – in this article, Nick explains some of the benefits and consequences.
Note: The post below was originally published by Nick Garland on LinkedIn in 2016. You can click here to read the original post.
The licence terms awarded to asbestos contractors have reduced year on year. I examine the latest data and offer an opinion on a better way forward.
A phrase every LARC will be familiar with, as it seems to be in all letters written by the HSE. One of the principle purposes of such a regime is to:
“…maintaining and improving standards of health and safety”
The Health and Safety Commission permissioning regime policy statement
Maintain and improve standards of H&S, presumably by weeding out the incompetent and promoting best practice. But why then are average licence terms shorter now than they were? I have been in the asbestos industry since the early 1990s, and I’ve definitely noticed the change. Can we infer that the HSE’s opinion is that the industry is less safe and less competent than it was?
Licence assessments can be a very unpredictable time. All of the companies that I work with have heard of, or experienced extremely intense assessment interviews, but at the same time hear of laissez faire ones with very little detailed examination. Requests (demands) from the ALPIs is often insightful but can also be bizarrely arbitrary, with little practical application. One licence assessment ended up insisting that filing cabinets be used (rather than the perfectly acceptable system the LARC already had) – resulting in the conversion of the one and only meeting room into an archive room.
We all know anecdotally that it has become harder and harder to get the ‘full’ three-year licence from the HSE, but the latest figures are quite stark.
ALG figures, supplied by ACAD.
ALG figures, supplied by ACAD.
Excluding new licences (always one year) there has been an alarming drop of 23% in three-year licences issued in that period.
ALG figures, supplied by ACAD.
In my experience the industry, whilst there are some bad eggs, is getting much better. When I think back to the beginning of my career, where it seemed everyone had a three-year licence – the differences are remarkable. Now projects consider the wider job and recognise non-asbestos hazards. In fact, it seems a different industry with most of the stories of astonishing individual poor practice in the past.
So, if we are not getting any worse and the principle aim of a permissioning regime is to drive standards, why are the licence terms going down?
Could it simply be that there are less licensed contractors out there and the HSE want to exert more control. A tighter leash if you like? Certainly, the tone of some licence assessments and HSE visits indicate this.
The HSE tell the wider construction industry (and clients) that they shouldn’t use the licence term as a tool for selection. If the company has been given a licence (any licence) that indicates that they (the HSE) are satisfied and this should be good enough. The clients however (quite reasonably) take the view that well if you are concerned enough that you won’t give them a 3-year licence, then we are concerned too.
A licence holder can’t notify a project that extends beyond the licence expiry date.
We add then that the HSE publish the expiry date of licences – so if you track these things, you can plot a company’s standing. A client also instantly sees which companies can notify the project that they are considering. This might not seem a big concern, but very complex major works, might require 2+ years to complete – knocking out 65% of contractors.
With this in mind – are the HSE less inclined to reduce the term for a huge company? Do they back away when a downward tweak might stop a multi-million £ job in a power station? Certainly ‘the word’ is that they do.
The licence term is certainly a commercial driver.
In my opinion the HSE should remove the fixed term licence. The HSE should assess a company and give, or withhold a licence based on the interview and past performance during site visits. These licences should not expire (I hear howls of outrage).
What should replace it is a tailored review schedule for that specific contractor. Essentially, ‘Yes we are content for you to work with asbestos, but we want to see you again in 6 months, or 12 months or 3 years, just to make sure things stay on track’. A structured plan could therefore be put in place on what improvements must be implemented before the next monitoring visit.
The monitoring schedule would not be published and would not appear on the licence itself. This therefore could not be used for contractor selection. The pressure would be released from the HSE to grant 3 year licences for commercial reasons. There would be no issue of notifying jobs beyond the end of the licence expiry date – as there won’t be one. The HSE can concentrate on maintain and improving standards and do so in a much more structured way.
As I say this is an opinion piece, and I would welcome everyone’s thoughts and feedback.
I have been in the asbestos industry since the early 1990s, helping licensed asbestos removal contractors stay at the forefront of the industry.
Written by Nick Garland on Friday April 13th 2018
The HSE’s assessment process for asbestos licences is rigorous – rightly so. Find out why so many of our clients at Assure360 are being granted three year licences, and how we could help you to get yours.
Becoming a licensed asbestos contractor (a LARC) is no easy thing. The HSE’s assessment is rigorous. They grant licenses for up to three years, but only a third of LARCs have this kind of licence – most have licences granted for periods of two years or less.
The last statistics widely shared by the HSE show the split for asbestos licences to be:
Licensed asbestos contractors (LARCs) produce method statements and documentation far more detailed and considered than their construction counterparts. They spend vast sums on training staff, and ensure levels of supervision beyond what other industries would even consider. Exposure monitoring has been a challenge, but the tests are done in line with guidance and by skilled analysts.
But when asked in the assessment:
too often the answer is a jumble of files, hard-to-decipher Excel spreadsheets, and in the worst case scenarios un-actioned paper audits. All these solutions are labour intensive – and as such tend to slip when workloads increase.
So why is assessment so challenging? Well, it’s meant to be. Asbestos is the most regulated industry after nuclear and as a ‘permissioning regime’, only the best companies should be given the stamp of approval.
With Assure360 Audit – our easy-to-use solution – all of these key tasks are made easy, and streamlined. With this treasure trove of time handed back to the team, they can focus on managing the projects. And better managed projects are more likely to be completed safely and on program. Simple.
Let’s look at the data on licences again, and this time compare all licence terms with the terms given to Assure360’s clients.
While we’re certainly not claiming all the credit for our clients’ high standards and competence – a great deal of expertise, hard work and dedication is needed from the entire team to perform to these high standards. But we feel there’s a relationship between the high proportion of three year licences amongst our clients and their ability to demonstrate competence and effective H&S management. We’re helping them to ensure that their efforts are directed at the right areas, and come licence renewal – they are able to demonstrate this fundamental understanding to the HSE.
There are other systems out there that help manage commercial aspects of projects from cradle to grave, but Assure360 is the only one designed specifically for the rigors of the asbestos licensing regime. Its effectiveness is born out by the figures and feedback from our clients and the HSE.
“The system the company has for assessing competence, conducting appraisals and supporting staff development is impressive and far better than seen elsewhere in the industry” HSE – LAR’s Licence Assessment
“We went from a new one-year licence to the full three years. Assure360 was invaluable in helping us demonstrate what we do best.” Peter Soltau SAS’ Licence Assessment
“What is particularly impressive about the system is the fact that it doesn’t just collect numbers. It presents information that allows you to make sensible decisions about the business” HSE at an Assure360 user’s recent Licence Assessment
Find out more about what our client’s think about Assure360 in these case studies.
Written by Nick Garland on Tuesday May 30th 2017
For decades, the HSE’s requirements have not been well communicated, or have been described in terms frequently misunderstood by the industry. The license holder (or the prospective one) has too often been left to work it out for themselves.
It takes a courageous removal company to stand their ground when presented with the opinion of the inspector on the spot. To be fair, there is no manual that the HSE can pull off the shelf describing the perfect asbestos removal company. But this ad hoc, local, opinion-led approach has produced a host of different solutions:
Whilst some of these questions are new to the last few years, exposure monitoring has been causing licence holders problems for my entire career.
But why is this so difficult? The LARCs – licensed asbestos removal consultants – do manage health and safety, producing method statements and documentation far more detailed and considered than their construction counterparts. They spend vast sums on training staff, and ensure levels of supervision beyond what other industries would even consider. Exposure monitoring has been a challenge, but the tests are done in line with guidance and by skilled analysts, perhaps just not frequently enough – but done.
So why do these questions become so difficult to answer in a licence renewal meeting?
First, there is no 100% right answer and nowhere to look for advice, beyond asbestos specialised health and safety consultants (like myself). The trade organisations can also pitch in with this, but the independents are too few and far between to help everyone. However, as all industries can tell you, parachuting in a consultancy to ‘identify and solve underpinning problems’ sometimes leads to superficial solutions. The way I have always approached it is to become embedded in that company – almost as a part time H&S manager or officer. This degree of understanding is vital for crafting solutions.
Second, the nature of licence renewal is often adversarial, with the future of the company on the line. This does not lead naturally to a relaxed environment where ‘business as usual’ can be showcased.
So, how can Assure360 help?
Firstly, all reputable asbestos removal companies conduct audits. These are sometimes conducted on Excel, or iAuditor (an interface with Excel) but often on paper. The problem with these solutions is that they tell you little beyond high level non-conformances and it can be challenging to extract meaningful trends. The paper version (or a PDF) is often a cul-de-sac, with non-conformances trapped on the paper, hidden in a file.
When asked – ‘How do you manage H&S?’, too often the answer is a jumble of files, hard to decipher Excel spreadsheets, and in worst case scenarios un-actioned paper audits.
Not so with Assure360. The audits completed on the free App are the most comprehensive available, developed by me over the past decade.
A warts-and-all approach, where ‘challenged’ sites are discussed, becomes real evidence of proactive management.
One client, Rob Wasson from Delta Services, recently contacted me after a licence renewal. He told me: “When I demonstrated the Assure360 system to the HSE, it made me proud of all that we had achieved.”
That degree of confidence and enthusiasm can only be massively influential at renewal time.
The new question that the HSE can nail us with is how do you ensure the competenceof your workforce?
Competence is a tricky customer and can be a complex thing to measure – after all, just showing them the training certificates is not enough. I’ve written previously on our blog about what to look for in a good competence scheme. Assure360 however does it all for you. The same comprehensive audits are just interpreted in a different way.
The beauty of this is that you have already done the work. So instead of one more job that your overstretched team are asked to do – it is a matter of moments.
In my experience when helping a licence holder prepare for the HSE, the one thing that they are least confident with is exposure monitoring. Often there has been plenty of ‘personals’ done (though sometimes not). Sometimes these are compiled into an Excel spreadsheet, though often not. When asked ‘how are these used?’ it is frequently met with a pregnant pause.
In some ways, the LARCs have been led up an exposure monitoring blind alley. People in asbestos removal often only have a vague understanding of what exposure monitoring is for (you can read more on this in my earlier article here). They get provided with dozens of 10-minute ‘personals’ that tell us next to nothing. The feeling of ‘what is the point of this beyond keeping the HSE happy?’ has some justification.
The approach that Assure360 has transforms every personal monitoring test into an assessment of how successful the method was.
With 360, ‘the point’ is clear – it has a direct impact on the improvement of methods.
Assure360 is specifically designed to address all the challenges I have identified in my nearly 25 years in the industry. For the past two years, it has been helping LARCs improve themselves and with that, the industry.
Ken Johnson from Delta Service recently told me: “The moment I saw the system demonstrated I knew it was an absolute must for us. It ticked so many boxes – all the areas that the entire industry seems to struggle with.”
The central theme is simplicity, Assure360 is a system, one that you follow, implement and operate yourself. Just by doing so you gain greater understanding of the management of your company. You operate it yourself (no expensive consultants) and everyone contributes – this simultaneously saves money and strengthens your health and safety culture.
To find out more how we can help, contact us today on 0845 226 4318
Written by Nick Garland on Thursday May 25th 2017
Here’s Nick Garland’s summary of the draft of the new Asbestos Analyst’s Guide from the HSE and what it suggests for hiring the right analyst.
The HSE’s new Asbestos Analysts Guide is coming soon or so we have been confidently told for the past year. The current tentative publication date is June 2017, but I have heard that even this is likely to slip. When we do get it, it is designed to help both Analysts and their clients comply with the Control of Asbestos Regulations 2012 and its ACoP.
It’s the client I am particularly aiming this summary at, but those with technical backgrounds should also find it useful. It is also for this reason that I largely don’t cover the appendices – in of themselves a whopping 178 pages’ long!
This is obviously a summary and clearly not intended to replace the Guide. In particular, the appendices contain a lot of important detail and should still be studied to gain the fullest picture. A note of caution, this is a review of the ‘draft for consultation’ – there may well be changes before final publication.
The early stages of the guide cover the critical areas of how to appoint an analyst and what quality control measures should be implemented by the consultancy.
This is the first time we have been given strong guidance on this subject, though it has long been the perceived best practice. This contractual relationship is critical to ensure independence and the control you will need
With this starting point, the HSE then require you to discuss the project in detail with the consultancy. The aim is to ensure that the consultancy understands what you the client wants and for you understand what you are going to get.
Areas to address:
The wording for this last point is particularly interesting. Reports should be designed to satisfy the client’s needs, not just perceived UKAS requirements. The frustrating ‘our reports have to look like this, it is part of our UKAS accreditation’ or ‘no we can’t give the data in that format, because…’ should all be a thing of the past.
The whole appointment and subsequent planning phase is intended to mimic the changes first introduced in the Surveying Guide in 2012. Planning (especially between the client and the surveyor) has become the major route to success. It is intended to get around the issue of “why do I never get what I asked for?” – the answer normally being “you didn’t ask for it…”
Underlying everything in CDM15. Asbestos removal projects are covered by CDM, this is a long-accepted fact. However, the analysts guide gives us a new twist. Contrary to the wording in CDM15, the guide specifically states that the analyst will be treated as a separate contractor. This has dramatic implications, as all asbestos removal projects – even the smallest ones – will therefore require the appointment of a Principal Contractor (PC) and a Principal Designer (PD).
Many of the asbestos consultancies have upskilled to take on the PD role, but the smaller ones may not accept the additional liabilities. This then is another duty for the client – appoint a PC and a PD to the project – and be confident that they have the skills to do it. This could be an asbestos consultancy that can accept the wider duties or a specialised PD that has the expertise in asbestos.
A key client responsibility in CDM15 is to ensure that the project is being run safely. Without this engagement and contractual control, ensuring safety would be largely impossible. Even then, without some expertise, you replace ‘ensure’ with ‘hope’.
The advice I always give clients is simple – become an educated one. Either train someone in your organisation or appoint a consultant independent of the asbestos project teams to be your expert advocate.
Employers must prevent or minimise exposure and as with all guidance, the phrase ‘so far as reasonably practicable’ is used. It also suggests that ‘live’ enclosure entry should be avoided – as this could lead to exposure above the Control Limit and with it, mandatory asbestos medicals.
I take two things from this: firstly, the pre-visual, much loved by contractors, is being officially frowned upon, and secondly the guide is suggesting that not all analysts need medicals. In my experience, site analytical work (clearances, leak air testing and so on), inevitably leads to exposure above the Control Limit at some point. I have two examples from my past, both seemingly very low risk that led to high personal exposure. The first, a contractor was removing a cement flue with hidden pure fibre in the flanges – a surprise failure at stage 3. The second was a straightforward Asbestos Insulating Board (AIB) job, where the High Efficiency Particle Air (HEPA) filter failed in the Negative Pressure Unit (NPU). Consequently, I believe all analysts should have medicals.
The guide makes clear that two copies of the Certificate for Reoccupation (CfR) must be issued – the building controller and the licensed contractor.
Personal exposure for analysts should be air tested (personals rather than static). The purpose of personal monitoring is not ‘merely’ duty of care and the data must be used for:
It gives direct guidance that personal monitoring should be performed in ~10% of case, targeting:
Whilst the control limit is highlighted, I find the other element more interesting. Minimise so far as reasonably practicable, risk assessment and effectiveness of controls drives the responsibilities of the employer much, much lower than just the control limit. There is therefore no ‘good enough’ and we should be striving for ever lower exposure. This has an impact on how long we run the tests for and what Limit of Quantification / Detection we set.
Whilst the number of required audits has stayed roughly the same, other checks to be recorded and studied have increased:
Approximately 5% should either be shadowed or blind inspected immediately afterwards:
During the consultation period, I know that there was some call for making the audits more specific – i.e. what type of clearance was it? This would bring it into line with survey audits.
The last bullet will be new to those that have not read the draft guide. The new 4-stage clearance process must include photographic evidence to support the decisions taken along the way. These will include such things as proof that the enclosure was free from gross contamination and dry before the visual inspection took place. The time and date stamp on the photos is intended to evidence the stated durations of each stage.
Maintain individual logs of all work completed by your analysts. These logs should record:
Six monthly auditing of Analysts’ performance (including a review of the above detailed logs).
Essentially the guide is calling for audits to record significantly more detail. Once we are collecting more we will have to do more with it. This will drive assessment of competence and training to new levels.
The difficulty is that a huge amount of data can be very time consuming to process. Just as the removal contractors found with the drive for competence on their side of the fence – the consultancies will have to develop new sophisticated systems to collect, analyse and present the data in meaningful ways.
The guide immediately highlights something that has been clear to me for a long time. What we ask of our analysts often strays from the standard UKAS requirements into other areas:
The guide also highlights the need for H&S training, in my opinion – critical basic training for any analyst.
We must also recognise that the very act of passing or failing a 4-stage clearance is a potentially stressful and intimidating situation. Consultancies should therefore provide support mechanisms and procedures to mitigate or eliminate. This will help ensure that analysts’ actions and decisions are impartial and independent. Personal qualities of ‘resilience’, ‘determination’ and ‘integrity’ will be required.
The guide covers the UKAS recognised proficiency training modules. Also highlighted is the requirement for sign-off by senior manager before any unsupervised work. However, the regulations tell us that Competence is not just a matter of a training certificate – we must ensure an employee is competent to do the job. But as I cover in my competence blog pieces – we can’t just leave it at that – just because I was signed off as competent last year doesn’t mean I still am.
The required participation of the client in the plan, plan, plan process is likely to expose a longstanding industry misunderstanding. When a client hears ‘Project Management’ they expect:
Initiating, planning, executing, controlling, and closing the work of a team to achieve specific goals and meet specific success criteria. The primary challenge of project management is to achieve all the project goals within the given constraints.
However, in most cases, Analytical Consultants mean:
Specify the project, review the method, supply an analyst to run air tests, provide a report after the clearance
The client sees the latter as a given, and assume that the asbestos consultancy’s definition of project management is the same as for other areas of construction. This disconnect from expectation and delivery leads to much of the dissatisfaction in the industry.
So how common are these skills:
It is a rare analytical company that even has these as categories on the skills matrix, never mind measures or audits them. They tend to be what we assume an analyst can do, without training. Managers have often described it to me as a ‘gut feeling’ about an analyst that leads them to promote them to a more senior role.
The guide’s focus on soft skills and project management presents a challenge to labs. Most companies currently do not even identify these soft skills in their competence matrix, never mind measure them.
The clear steer is that to be ‘competent’ (i.e. knowledge, skills and experience) an analyst needs to go far beyond just the ability to operate within a UKAS environment. We see far reaching implications for training and competence – a consultancy’s approach in this key area should form a key part of the selection process.
Get in touch with us to discuss how Assure360 can help with:
Written by Nick Garland on Thursday April 27th 2017
The data shows that the licence terms awarded to asbestos contractors have reduced year on year. But in my view, standards in our industry are improving. So what’s going on? And is there a a better way forward for asbestos licensing?
A phrase every LARC will be familiar with, as it seems to be in all letters written by the HSE. One of the principle purposes of such a regime is:
“…maintaining and improving standards of health and safety”
The Health and Safety Commission permissioning regime policy statement
Maintain and improve standards of H&S, presumably by weeding out the incompetent and promoting best practice. But why then are average licence terms shorter now than they were? I have been in the asbestos industry since the early 1990s, and I’ve definitely noticed the change. Can we infer that the HSE’s opinion is that the industry is less safe and less competent than it was?
Licence assessments can be a very unpredictable time. All of the companies that I work with have heard of, or experienced extremely intense assessment interviews, but at the same time hear of laissez faire ones with very little detailed examination. Requests (demands) from the ALPIs is often insightful but can also be bizarrely arbitrary, with little practical application. One licence assessment ended up insisting that filing cabinets be used (rather than the perfectly acceptable system the LARC already had) – resulting in the conversion of the one and only meeting room into an archive room.
We all know anecdotally that it has become harder and harder to get the ‘full’ three-year licence from the HSE, but the latest figures are quite stark.
ALG figures, supplied by ACAD.
ALG figures, supplied by ACAD.
Excluding new licences (always one year) there has been an alarming drop of 23% in three-year licences issued in that period.
ALG figures, supplied by ACAD.
In my experience the industry, whilst there are some bad eggs, is getting much better. When I think back to the beginning of my career, where it seemed everyone had a three-year licence – the differences are remarkable. Now projects consider the wider job and recognise non-asbestos hazards. In fact, it seems a different industry with most of the stories of astonishing individual poor practice in the past.
So, if we are not getting any worse and the principle aim of a permissioning regime is to drive standards, why are the licence terms going down?
Could it simply be that there are less licensed contractors out there and the HSE want to exert more control. A tighter leash if you like? Certainly, the tone of some licence assessments and HSE visits indicate this.
The HSE tell the wider construction industry (and clients) that they shouldn’t use the licence term as a tool for selection. If the company has been given a licence (any licence) that indicates that they (the HSE) are satisfied and this should be good enough. The clients however (quite reasonably) take the view that well if you are concerned enough that you won’t give them a 3-year licence, then we are concerned too.
A licence holder can’t notify a project that extends beyond the licence expiry date.
We add then that the HSE publish the expiry date of licences – so if you track these things, you can plot a company’s standing. A client also instantly sees which companies can notify the project that they are considering. This might not seem a big concern, but very complex major works, might require 2+ years to complete – knocking out 65% of contractors.
With this in mind – are the HSE less inclined to reduce the term for a huge company? Do they back away when a downward tweak might stop a multi-million £ job in a power station? Certainly ‘the word’ is that they do.
The licence term is certainly a commercial driver.
In my opinion the HSE should remove the fixed term licence. The HSE should assess a company and give, or withhold a licence based on the interview and past performance during site visits. These licences should not expire (I hear howls of outrage).
What should replace it is a tailored review schedule for that specific contractor. Essentially, ‘Yes we are content for you to work with asbestos, but we want to see you again in 6 months, or 12 months or 3 years, just to make sure things stay on track’. A structured plan could therefore be put in place on what improvements must be implemented before the next monitoring visit.
The monitoring schedule would not be published and would not appear on the licence itself. This therefore could not be used for contractor selection. The pressure would be released from the HSE to grant 3 year licences for commercial reasons. There would be no issue of notifying jobs beyond the end of the licence expiry date – as there won’t be one. The HSE can concentrate on maintain and improving standards and do so in a much more structured way.
As I say this is an opinion piece, and I would welcome everyone’s thoughts and feedback.
I have been in the asbestos industry since the early 1990s, helping licensed asbestos removal contractors stay at the forefront of the industry.
Let me know what you think. Drop me a line using the email at the bottom of this page.
Written by Nick Garland on Monday February 16th 2015
My experience is that personal monitoring is much misunderstood and therefore underused tool in the box. Often given lip service, ignored completely or done in a huge rush in the 6 months before license renewal. When it isn’t overlooked it is rarely used in a way that is of much practical use. Certainly the asbestos management databases that I have seen out there don’t seem to handle the data in any meaningful way.
Exposure monitoring should not be seen as another regulatory requirement that must be complied with, but rather an excellent way of auditing removal techniques and therefore designing better ones.
Other than ‘Error’ (test results representing something other than what was stated), measured exposure significantly above or below that anticipated indicates one of the following:
All of these events should be investigated – 1 & 2 as something went wrong, 4 & 5 because there is good practice to pass on. In fact 1 & 2 should be treated as an accident/incident and closed out as such. Measured exposure ‘at’ the anticipated level could be viewed as a near-miss.
A well constructed Excel sheet can process this data adequately, but a database would make the extraction and investigation a smooth joined up process.
Obstacles to the process that I have come across are – actually doing the personal monitoring with regularity and enough spread to cover all activities, the site team (‘we’d get in trouble if we gave them a high reading’) and the analyst themselves (too high limits of detection and vague/non-existent description of the activity tested). The last two can be solved by education.
Properly collected and collated data could then inform better research (at company or industry level) in areas that might make a big difference to the lads in the enclosure. This isn’t meant to be a shameless plug, but it’s worth mentioning that we designed the www.Assure360.co.uk system to help with this. We felt the most important elements to design in, must cover:
So that was our attempt at scoping a solution, aided by anonymous benchmarking tool to compare your results against the industry. That way, the exercise becomes a pro-active tool to improve standards, rather than just to predict exposure more accurately.