The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) is urging public liability insurance customers to ensure their workers are adequately protected when working at height.

Its warning came after the prosecution of a Stoke-on-Trent firm following a worker fell from the first floor of a building last year and suffered life-threatening injuries.

G Baskerville of Cobridge pleaded guilty to breaching section 2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 and was fined £8,000, while also being made to pay £6,000 in costs.

Newcastle-under-Lyme magistrates court heard how the employee was using a power saw at Barnfields Industrial Estate in Staffordshire when he fell through the side of a building after its walls had been removed.

Guy Dale, HSE inspector, said that although there was a horizontal steel girder around the sides of the building, there were still substantial gaps and a significant risk that other workers could have fallen to the ground below.

APS (Association for Project Safety), the AIF (Access Industry Forum), and Working Well Together, are behind the conference and they intend to present a discussion based conference, exhibition including live demonstrations. Keynote speakers include Russell Adfield of the HSE and further contributions will be on subjects such as pasma training, scaffolding, fall prevention and ladder safety. Demonstrations will be on MEWP’s, elevating work platforms and mobile access towers.

The House of Lords’ Merits Committee is conducting a study to assess the degree to which Government departments check whether legislation is actually working as anticipated. As part of this process the Work at Height Regulations 2005 (WAH 2005) will be subject to in-depth review and views are requested by 11 September 2009.

The Committee intends to establish if government departments review the assumptions in their Explanatory Memoranda and Impact Assessments to provide better information for the development of future legislation. The inquiry has two main strands:

• National Audit Office is conducting a statistical survey of a significant number of Statutory Instruments from 2005 to see how many have been reviewed and
• a small number of regulations have been selected for more in-depth review, including WAH 2005.

Comment: This study will open up a number of issues ranging from the ‘banning of ladders’ to allegations of government ‘gold plating’ to the original European Directive. Debate over the ‘two metre’ rule may also rise to the surface again. However, with construction fatalities at the lowest number and frequency rate on record the House of Lords Committee should hear some very positive evidence on the effectiveness of WAH 2005.

In one of the most significant developments in the health and safety sector in recent years, leading occupational health and safety charity, the British Safety Council (BSC), has applied to become an accredited centre to teach NEBOSH qualifications.

The new courses will be delivered alongside the BSC’s existing qualifications, and will make the BSC the first health and safety organisation to offer a full suite of accredited qualifications to meet the needs of the market.

Brian Nimick, Chief Executive of the BSC, said: “By offering NEBOSH courses alongside our own, the BSC will be in a unique position to offer a complete choice to the UK and international markets”.

“People already come to the BSC because they see us as a one stop shop for high quality health and safety services”.

“They will now have even better access to qualification programmes of the highest standard”.

Pinnacle Scaffolding Ltd of Stockton on Tees, Cleveland, was fined £27,000 and ordered to pay £6,000 in costs by Sheffield Crown Court after pleading guilty to a breach of the Work at Height Regulations 2005.