Posted By Swis http://www.dailymail.co....mmers-doing-lengths.html

Posted By Yossarian Well goodness only knows what they'd make of our Ruth doing this: http://www.iosh.co.uk/in...m?go=news.release&id=673

Posted By Swis I believe, it’s all about poor risk assessment… The number of guards would not make any difference to whether swimmers swim in lengths or widths. (unless you close a section of the swimming pool.)

Posted By Bob Y Swis, you may be right, but the Daily Mail are wonderful at 'elf and safety bashing', and 'Council bashing'. I for one tire of it. You shouldn't assume that we are getting all of the facts. Firstly we are, as always with newspaper reports being given 'selective' information, for instance the report may well have missed out that the pool was in fact divided; we do that with our pools on a regular basis. Secondly with the VERY limited knowledge that we have from the report, I wouldn't go as far as saying that this was a poor risk assessment; it might actually be a pretty good one and might have arrived at just the right conclusion. I don't think it is fair to pass judgement on the person that has done the assessment on the basis of such limited information. As I say I am in the middle of reviewing our assessment for the number of lifeguards. I have been doing RA's for more years than I can remember and in fairness my approach has changed significantly over that period, but doing this particular assessment has been 'interesting' to say that least as it requires consideration of quite a number of different factors.

Posted By Bob Y Well we have to disagree. When presented with the very limited facts that we have it seems pretty unfair to me, to pass judgement on the person having made a poor risk assessment or being "..extremely stupid". If your work had been described as being 'poor' or you had been described as being 'extremely stupid' then I would think you might justifiably be pretty miffed that such a conclusion had been reached on such flimsy 'evidence'. In fairness the Daily Mail have a cunning knack of misrepresenting many 'health and safety' stories. After all we wouldn't want the truth or the facts to get in the way of a good story, would we.

Posted By Bob Y I am not sure that I said the persons reputation was put at risk by non factual reporting, and personally I think that the Courts have better things to do. What I was alluding to was that I thought that it was unfair to jump to a sweeping conclusion of poor risk assessment and calling someone extremely stupid was unfair based on the content of a (of all things, Daily Mail) report. The report suggests to me that the pool was divided across, not along the length. In fairness many pools including all of ours are 25m in length, which are ideal for practising for most events, for obvious reasons. I suggest that the decision would have come about after careful examination of the circumstances that the swimming centre was faced with, of which we know little or nothing. Yes, you're right they could have just said, sod it lets just close the pool, which would have been of little benefit to the local population who want to swim, but it seems to me is that they have sat down looked at the problem, reassessed and come up with what they thought was a sensible and workable solution. Health and safety isn't just about saying 'no you can't do that' it's about being creative, thoughtful, resourceful, analytical and finding solutions, that's what makes it so interesting and for the most part so enjoyable.

Posted By Crim I just read the article and can see some sense there. I know from experience that when swimming lengths once you reach the shallow end there are loads of non swimmers just splashing about and this affects the continuity. My gym has a pool of 25 metres long and if you count the lengths its 32 = half mile, and 64 = 1 mile etc. You can still swim the same distance no matter what the pool size. Further if this rule makes it safer for those less competent swimmers by sectioning off the shallow end what's the problem? This could actually be health and safety making common sense?

Posted By Brian Hagyard Swis Suggest you do some more research and not rely on the Daily Mail. a collegue of mine heard this on the radio yesterday and a quick internet search showed the original local parer story. The 25M width verses 33M length argument was quoted as the main factor in the decision. Health and Safety was a minor point. Brian P.S. Its Friday can we please play nicely now?

Posted By Bob Y I find it absolutely 'fantastical' (is that a real word?)even worrying, that anyone can come to such a sweeping and definitive conclusion on the basis of yet another 'council bashing', 'health and safety bashing' report in the Daily Mail. It beggars belief that we can conclude that these people have absolutely no idea at all about what they are doing on that basis. I can only assume that the decision must have been made by the department that some people obviously feel that all councils have, that is full of total incompetents who have absolutely no idea at all what they are doing and is only there for the purpose of making everybody's lives a misery. OMG I could almost be writing for the DM! I am at the point of wondering whether I should include the DM on my list of essential reading for CPD.

Posted By Pete48 I am no longer sure which is the more harmful to H&S. The original stories or this style of anorak discussion being played out on this forum every time there is a story about H&S which doesn't match the veracity of the case as perceived by the safety community. As Oscar Wilde said "By giving us the opinions of the uneducated, journalism keeps us in touch with the ignorance of the community."

Posted By martinw A little more up to date perhaps: 'A word to the wise ain't necessary. It's the stupid ones who need the advice.' --Bill Cosby

Posted By Peter Still Forgive my ignorance, but could someone please explain to me why swimmers apparently need more lifeguards when swimming lengths than they do when swimming widths?

Posted By Phil Rose I think that more accurately some people understand that they probably aren't getting the full picture from the report and aren't so willing to pass judgement on something that they don't have the full facts of.

Posted By Swis There’re several articles on this incident, some with referring to officials responses. These responses do associated the decision based due to health and safety reasons (one way or the other.). We are talking about a pool assessment here which is not a rocket science. When you make a stupid decision on the name of health and safety, it will be highlighted in the media. (vultures out there are always looking for such prey) I could see no ho-ha or articles in national papers, if the decisions was in the form of the following wordings: “We are banning the lengths due to some management problems” This is a management failure and please don’t try to convey it as a health and safety failure. Supporting such decisions surely isn’t healthy for our profession.