Posted By the badger A question for the weekend. (A problem which I had to tackle earlier this week!) You are a health and safety professional and you are well up to speed on all the latest stuff including WAHR. The roof on your house has developed a leak. You ask a local building contractor to come and look at it. He arrives on his own, leans his ladder against the gutter and in no time at all is at the top of it and then is climbing around all over the pitched roof which is fairly steep in places. There is nothing to stop him falling off except the friction between his trainers and the roof tiles. He finds what he says is the problem then is back on the ground again giving you a very reasonable quote for a repair - and he can do it that afternoon. Your neighbours say this man does an excellent job. What do you do? 1) Accept the quote and decide that how he does the job is his business and not yours. 2) Accept the quote and go out for the rest of the day so you cannot see him doing the job. 3) Give him the benefit of your vast experience as a health and safety professional, brief him on WAHR and then ask him to quote for doing the job safely. 4) Other (please specify).

Posted By Saracen11 Hi badger, don't forget to tell him about defects/problems you know to be there... if he fell through and injured himself, he would be able to sue you... on your Building Insurance I think? (ok, I know he's there to repair a damaged roof, but tell him exactly where the problem areas are). ... and go out whilst he does the job! Regards

Posted By Anwar Afzal Badger, Your joking are'nt you? how can you accept the quote and let him get on with the job, this is morally wrong and unjust. You got to haggle man, tell him you had a cheaper quote from another roofer and get him to under cut it by another 100 quid mate, i would!!!!!!!

Posted By Ian Waldram It's good to have a laugh - but if I knew of an IOSH member who was really thinking like most of the responses detailed above, I'd want to quote to them point 1 of our Code of Professional Conduct. In organisations with advanced OSH cultures, everyone is encouraged to intervene if they see someone else at risk, whatever their position in the organisation. I've done it a few times in public situations, and it's mostly gone better than I had feared before speaking up. One example was on commercial premises next door to my home, where a young lad was jet cleaning the quite steep asbestos-cement roofing from a single board, with ladder access and no edge protection against a fall of some 12ft. I spoke to his boss, who had newly moved in and was wanting to smarten up the premises, explaining why I was concerned for his safety - and we've had a very friendly relationship ever since. It takes courage, but if you're an IOSH member, your actions should always be based on Code point 1, whatever your relationship to the individual you believe to be at risk. Apologies if ths sounds a bit pompous - but the reason IOSH and other professional bodies are allowed to be charities is that our fundamental aims are for the public good, not for our own members' benefit. My own roof was completely replaced last year, I told the architects and all bidders I was an OSH professional and expected good access standards, and I still got a fair price and a good job.

Posted By Al.. I respect what Ian says and it is point which is well made. But I wonder how many of the rest of us do the same? I guess that’s what Badger is asking. Are we health and safety professionals only while at work, or 24 hours a day? Every time we arrange for contractor to come do a job, big or small, at our houses, do we state in advance that we want good standards of health and safety? I don’t (it is usually option 1 or 2 above for me) but perhaps I should. (Maybe there is an option 4. I could wait until the chap is on the roof then call the HSE! But then I might be left with a job half done!) Al