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KEITH ROWSON  
#1 Posted : 14 November 2017 21:26:15(UTC)
Rank: Forum user
KEITH ROWSON

I started work as a Bricklayer for a major house builder five weeks age and I cannot believe the working practices if it wasn't so serious it would be comical. 1: supposedly suppressing dusty roads (RCS) by dry sweeping with mechanical road sweeper, plumes of dust 2. Excavations some 3 metres deep unsupported with workers inside and a JCB a further 3 metres above on a mound of excavated earth of about forty ton adding extra loading to the unsupported sides. Furthermore the JCB is digging the excavations deeper while workers inside and he cannot see them. 3: Scaffold erected with crash decking and two foot gaps in openings where workers can fall through. 4: Asked to build blockwork on first floor off new floor decking up to 4 ft six high with no edge protection to prevent a fall and no protection for people below. I refused of course. 5. Joiners installing flooring on first floor with no edge protection and the flooring covered in ice. 6: so much proximity working between plant and people and no segregation whatsoever. 7: Pile driving taking place some 50 feet away and you can feel the vibration underfoot, it was so bad that while building a block wall 10 metres long and 2 metres high the whole wall collapsed I believe the technical term is liquefaction where the mortar separates from the water in it. It missed two workers by inches. 11: Asked to manually handle solid concrete block to a height of Six foot nine. 12: Scafftags put on scaffold prior to H&S visit by their H&S manager and all out of date yet on green and scaffold in use. 13: Toe boards missing and materials stacked above the handrail and brick guard. 14: To access your individual plot you have to wade through rubble, mud that sinks passed your boots and pass JCB's, telehandlers and dumpers and there is no speed restrictions its a race track. 15: Having to install pre cast concrete arches with brick slips manually weighing in excess of 100 kg with no temporary support measures, some use bits of timber some wedge scaffold tubes to hold, if it did decide to go nothing would stop it. I am looking for another job as this site is so dangerous. I have only returned to Construction after a break of some seventeen years and I believed things had improved from when I last worked on site, however my impressions are that it is, on this site at least non existent. The irony of it all is that before you start on this site they insist on a CSCS card.
johnmurray  
#2 Posted : 15 November 2017 07:01:56(UTC)
Rank: Super forum user
johnmurray

Seems about average to me. I'll raise you: watched two guys mounting a steel lintol yesterday....from a telehandler....one standing on the forks and pushing, the other standing on a scaffold tube and pulling. Height 10 metres +-. No WAH restraints. Average day.
RayRapp  
#3 Posted : 15 November 2017 08:35:57(UTC)
Rank: Super forum user
RayRapp

Keith

Great posting and serves as a reminder (if it was needed) that many so-called reputable organisations still ignore basic health and safety requirements whilst putting people at risk. I suggest there is only one thing left to do - advise the HSE, alternatively PM me the site details and I will do the dirty deed.

Ray

thanks 1 user thanked RayRapp for this useful post.
KEITH ROWSON on 15/11/2017(UTC)
safetydude1  
#4 Posted : 15 November 2017 08:40:05(UTC)
Rank: Forum user
safetydude1

Report to the H.S.E! This is not if, it's when!

thanks 1 user thanked safetydude1 for this useful post.
KEITH ROWSON on 15/11/2017(UTC)
KEITH ROWSON  
#5 Posted : 15 November 2017 12:43:14(UTC)
Rank: Forum user
KEITH ROWSON

Thanks for the response everyone, I must admit it had crossed my mind in reporting the issues, and I will do that if nothing changes I am not afraid to do this for the sake of myself and others. What it has confirmed to me is that even the very large building companies still have no conception of their statutory duties in regard basic H&S and by that I mean the HASAWA 1974, CDM 2015 and Management Regulations 1999. They either don't know what they are doing, which makes me very concerned in regard the Regulation 7 MHSAWR 1999 or they don't care. Their H&S guy was on site and was concerned about the gaps in the scaffold as the tubes (standards) raise through the scaffold, a concern I see as a trip. Yet nothing was mentioned in regard the falls between the scaffold and the crash decks some two feet apart. More worryingly is that the after the visit the scaffold remained in use with no alterations. I believe we need to refuse to work on such dangerous scaffold or nothing will be done, not to mention as an individual we too have a statutory duty in regard sections 7a and 7b of HASAWA 1974. I am not in work today and tomorrow because I will wait until the scaffold is raised and provide a safe working environment I refused to work at height without a protected edge. Lives are more important than money, well to me they are! maybe not to some large construction companies.
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