Hi all I just thought I'd draw your attention to this excellent analysis of another spurious Daily Mail 'elf n' safety' story: http://www.butireaditint...ies-from-the-daily-mail/ This is a good example of how many of the myths surrounding health and safety are generated by an unscrupulous press - and it's very effectively taken to pieces by the blog's author. Kind regards Lucy Barnes e-Communications Assistant

Easy fix, If you can't eliminate the risk substitute the Red Arrows with Patrulla Aguila! Almost silent by comparison! ;-)

Oh dear, Lucy If reference to an unregulated gutter website that has neither authority nor substance is the best that IOSH and its e-Communications section can do, then its a very sad day. It certainly isn't an "excellent analysis", any more that the original article may have been. You might choose to view it as a 'good example of how many of the myths surrounding health and safety are generated by an unscrupulous press - and it's very effectively taken to pieces by the blog's author'. But is your author scrupulous? In fact, who is s/he? I notice that the blog is anonymous so its hardly a reliable or reputable source of information to back your own opinion, or do you think that it is? Are the arguments presented on that blog based on or supported by fact? Is there a jot of experience or some recogised qualification to back the "argument" that you want, and want everyone else, to accept as gospel? Please IOSH, stick to facts. Use peer-reviewed and properly constructed evidence to back your ex-Cathedra statements, or hold on to those statements since otherwise they are worth no more that the ones written by that anonymous blogger, or for that matter those written by a national newspaper journalist who at least shows courtesy to his/her readers but puting a name against the article. Slipping down to "their" level reflects badly on a professional organisation. Surely, IOSH standards are better than that?

Stuff, I think Ians point is that it was posted by Lucy under an IOSH banner thus giving it some weight that might not be appropriate? I think the link is a good one as it shows us a blog where the approach taken by modern media to story telling is challenged and it happens on this occassion to be about H&S. Blogs do carry a certain authority in the public domain despite Ians rather strong denial of their validity as a source. Equally interesting is the basis of Ians reply which will not accept anything other peer review and properly constructed evidence based information. This carries the danger that a huge area of modern communication will be missed or, more dangerously, dismissed. However as we can see from Ian's reply the fact that it has the IOSH banner against it on this occassion means it can and will be read as "IOSH says"and that requires careful arrangement of context. I disagree with Ian's rather strong dismissal of the bloggers environment but have to accept his point that the link has no more authority than the original article in the Daily Mail and that terms such as "excellent analysis" are perhaps misplaced. "an interesting view from a blogger of a recent story in the Daily Mail" might have been my description. P48

I suspect most of the time that these newspaper articles are worth no more than tomorrows chip wrapper though some do actually touch on valid issues, and almost all seem to touch a nerve here! The issue is in the approach to dealing with them. Everyone can puff and blow, but if IOSH is to respond as a professional organisation it should do better that point to an equally dubious and anonyomous blog to find support. If there are no facts and no evidence then keep quiet because you are really not able properly to counter the original article with which you feel so at odds. But if you do have some evidence, then present it openly and in detail for the reader to consider. If you consider that these articles are the vitriol of the gutter press, using gutter tactics to rebut them is no better. I will say again that IOSH could and should rise above that tactic and do much better.

Possibly, but do you have evidence for that statement? [Clue: a dodgy web page won't be enough]

What do I need evidence for ? Most elf-'n'-safety stories feature stacks of rhetoric and no facts ! Everybody knows it...got to be true...did'n ya know it ? Anyway, here is a statement from another dodgy website (not this one, another one): "Well, as usual it was a Health and Safety concern. Despite the fact nobody has ever died of fish-and-chip-paper-poisoning, at least not as far as I’m aware of, it was deemed unsafe in case the ink used for the newsprint came off on the food. I dare say that in order for this to be a problem you would have to eat fish and chips for breakfast, lunch, dinner and supper every day for every year of your life, and by then you’d die from your blood having slowly turned into a mixture of cooking oil and batter"

I’m at “their” level. It made me smile, even if it did nothing more than edit newspaper reports dressed with emotive and provocative terms. Admittedly it isn’t peer reviewed but then why would it be, it’s just an anti tabloid website? After all it makes no factual claims unlike the poorly written articles it attacks. Has IOSH promoted, supported or endorsed this site, no, if Lucy brought this to the forum’s attention then well done her. If by an accident of registry she shows as an IOSH staff member, then I won’t hold that against her. However had the link appeared on the IOSH home page, then that would be a different matter.

Ian, the debunking in this case is using internal inconsistencies within the story, and does not rely on the author of the blog having reference to external material, or even the ''facts' of the story. It's just a short piece which could be a textbook example of the way that the black-top tabloids (in particular) work. The veracity of the DM in particular has been the subject of numerous studies, and if you took time to read Flat Earth News you would notice that it has an entire chapter on the DM. To my knowledge there has been no attempt by the DM or its publisher to challenge the author of Flat Earth News on the information he presents. As a profession we seem to be lamentably unaware of what the media is, how it works and the purposes it serves, and I personally have no qualms at all about the IOSH banner being used in connection with this thread. Many contributors even to this forum seem to accept H&S headline myths, and we really shouldn't, because they are just myths, John

I surpose the 38 ton lorrys going through the high street all day wouldnt affect the foundations of a 500yr old building then !!!!! as a jet would pass in just a few seconds..... the daily mail are realy scrapping the barell for a story which we all know is codswallop!!!!!

Here’s something to stir it all up again from Todays’ Guardian, no less. The guardian said - Tottenham Hotspur have become the first Premier League club to ban vuvuzelas from their ground. And they add - Spurs said in a statement on their website: - "We are concerned that the presence of the instruments within the stadium pose unnecessary risks to public safety and could impact on the ability of all supporters to hear any emergency safety announcements.” All fairly reasonable, until we get to why they really want to ban them - "We are very proud of the fantastic atmosphere that our supporters produce organically at White Hart Lane and we are all very much looking forward to this continuing into the forthcoming season." My point here is that they don’t want to have the damned vuvuzelas in their ground and so they formulate a semi-reasonable “elf ‘n’ safety” excuse to do their dirty work. Why not just come out and ban them! Tell the world that we’d all prefer to hear fans singing from the stands than a monotonous drone for 90mins. Again, the media perpetuates the myth that “elf ‘n’ safety” has again spoiled everyones fun, only this time it’s in a “reputable” daily broadsheet and comes from a “reputable” football club.

Ian The Daily Mail has rubbished its own story by writing the second article I refer to above. The book Flat Earth News by Nick Davies reflects a study into how the media distort the news. It has not received a great deal of publicity in the newspapers because, as the columnist Peter Oborne states: 'Nick Davies has amassed an overwhelming weight of evidence that the British media lies, distorts facts and routinely breaks the law.' The newspaper industry is particularly sensitive to criticism of itself. So it follows that they have not promoted the findings in his book. Now this is hardly news. However Nick Davies has provided the evidence. As John has pointed out, if the Daily Mail thought it had be liabled or Chapter 10 entitled Mail Aggression was factually wrong, they probably would have taken Mr Davies to court. So using Flat Earth News seems as good a reference on Daily Mail distortions as anything else. Cheers. Nigel

Od dear, a classical education but n'ere a Sunday in church. Does it show?

Afternoon Ian, I don't see much staff or righteousness among H&S practitioners, and I employ four of them (and I am one myself). What I see is people trying very hard to get a difficult and sometimes unwelcome message across. Now it may be because of the industries different people work in, but an unbending and stiff-necked approach wouldn't get me (or any of my team) very far. And that's why I react in the way I do to journalists distortions of reality in the service of a political agenda. Not just the DM by the way; I was reading a piece by a BBC journalist the other day in which he said that reporting has had to try very hard over the last 20 years to become as disreputable as it is. One of the favourite whipping boys of the media is H&S, but we all should consider this: risk and safety decisions are made in their millions every working day in this country. Of these decisions the vast majority are so unexceptionable as to pass without comment, so why should we sit back and let a few journalists trash our profession? Especially when their headlines (as is so often the case with the blacktops) don't even reglect the story content, John

I noticed in a certain large supermarket chain the other day a statement that you could not return baby milk for health and safety reasons.... when questioned what health and safety regs covered baby milk i was refered to their health and safety dept !

While Mr Blokes (??) seems a little behind in his reading of current affairs, Mr Potts raises another interesting and far more relevant point though I cannot see the relevance to this thread..... Where does it say that the health and safety reasons put forward by any company are invalid unless and until they have been enshrined in H&S law? If they, the supermarket, want to create a H&S rule that says customers will not return a specified product then that is that (subject to Sale of Goods etc). It's their H&S rule - if you don't like it shop elsewhere, but as you walk along the High Street ponder on the site rules than mandate hard hats, gloves and goggles for all. I don't recall that debated in Parliament. It's a site rule and perhaps will be easier to understand - very straightforward and to the point and you can like it, or lump it.