Posted By Geoff Burt Agree with everything you've said Ralph. I hadn't realised before this debate how much difference there is between the interpretations of the PS role. You're nearly right about my background except that like yourself I also act as advisor for clients who have commissioned building work, as well as PS on other projects. One comment was about agents. The majority of our PS activities are through an agent for the various clients. We are commissioned by the agent as PS. It should be noted the agents usually have no H&S skills, we provide these. We issue the pre-tender H&S Plan and approve the contractors response (usually after a number of negotiations). These findings are passed onto the client via the agent. On one occasion we have reported the prospective contractors H&S consultants to IOSH for misrepresentation of their professional status. On two other occasions the prospective contractors have withdrawn their tenders following our intervention, and resubmitted greatly improved plans - both took on retained professional safety advisors to assist them. I see that as a success for safety and helps justify (to an extent) CDM. On the subject of the role of advisor to a client commissioning building work you are entitled in that position to see if the work is being carried out safely - CDM is irrelevant to this. I remember attending CDM training some years ago - for the PS role. I was the only safety professional on the course, the rest were QS or architects. I'd thought some of them were joking when they indicated they had not heard of the HS&W Act. It was apparent during the course that the whole thing was new to some of them. Unfortunately, what's come across in this debate is demarcation lines, talk about inflexible attitudes, quoting the law and a number of generally pedantic statements. No real attempt has been made to answer questions put by contributors. What we should be talking about is how we can resolve these issues - surely we are all aiming for the same thing. Geoff

Posted By Geoff Burt Ken Perhaps you have highlighted why we have such diverse opinions on this thread. All of my projects have been construction work that cannot be fully separated from the client activities (a number of them are schools!). I have to work closely with the client to ensure we have caught all the issues. Which means looking at risk assessments, method statements, access arrangements, the affect on the local roads and so on. However, with a greenfield site, I would still insist on seeing if adequate procedures and provisions were in place. 'Adequate' seems, at least on this thread, to be the controversial word. But as I've asked before perhaps someone could answer how this is done without the PS seeing the contractor provisions for dealing with the risks? Geoff

Posted By Jason Gould Hi again Iv'e been following this thread and seem to be more comfortable with Geoffs explanation or viewpoint of how the proccess should work. The client has the right to be kept informed of any circumstances that may put peoples lives at risk. The PS is usually chosen as a middle man. Then surely he has the right to check all piles (as you put it) of paperwork. When I Asked the questions I posted earlier about this turning into a quality issue. The comments posted afterwards seem to strenghen my beleief that this indeed is turning into a quality of documentation and presentation issue. Any contractor must surely have to re-assess the way they wish to satisfy the client, PS etc. This will unfortuantly probably mean that they have to develop a system (does not nessassarily mean paperbased) where he can show he can produce both site specific and generic assessments after any request for them has been made. Obvously the ins and outs of this procedure needs a lot of disscussion. But this could well be the intention of CDM. Who Knows but personally I think this is a last minute wake up call for the rouge contractors. Just a laymans point of view. Regards jason

Posted By Gareth Smith it is only possible to actually do a true risk assessment (specific) when an actual change of the working environment is imminent or is likely to be relating to one area or a particular designated area for the risk assessment to be meaningful. if say new installations require only certain personell to be allowed entry for that area, then a permit to work is required, if this type of situation is unlikely to occur for some time, then why do a thorough (specific) risk assessment, when only a generic assessment would be suffice for the period between. an ideal situation to carry out an updated risk assessment would be the day prior to the changes actually happening, then existing hazards would have been covered by the generic assessment, and the updated assessment would then emphasise the new apparent changes to the immediate area/s, it would be impossible and certainly wouldnt be cost effective to any company to administer all necessary changes immediatley when the changes could be months away from fruition. most construction sites as you say change from one minute to another, these small changes should be added daily along with their individual regulations or code of practices to that particular task through tool box talks for example. any new risks that could cause potential serious harm would therfore have to be re-assessed into a specific risk assessment before actual changes take place and include all changes of the surounding environment. this is what i would have to entail whilst siteing a crane in a particular area, for a specific task, and the assessment would be inforce until we had finnished the agreed task, as implimented in a submitted method statement,then the client would now then be able to carry out their own risk assessment if it meant any significant changes to working conditions, and what would be required. in my eyes, specific relates to individual pieces,areas or zones generic means broadbased low hazard and basic site rules apply in similar environments, a widely used term in many industries applying to their personal knowledge of what is, or what can