H&S gone too far?

As somebody who works in Health and Safety, I can only say that someone who doesn't want to do something will always find an excuse to not to do, and the right person will do the right thing no matter what.

From my own point of view H&S is there to ensure that you do the things you have to do as safely and in as well planned a fashion as is practical. The application of H&S by muppets is the problem
 
I served for 32 years in the fire service and was involved in a number of water rescues in that time often unfortunately far too many turned out to be nothing more than body retrievals. I am aware of the potential risks involved and have to admit that sometimes we took calculated risks that were outside of standing orders but it was risks that we considered necessary at the time. Unfortunately these days the officer in charge is given very little latitude and will be hauled over the coals if he allows himself or his crew to be exposed to any sort of unnecessary risk. In effect the fire service has changed and has become very risk averse. I don’t think that I would like to serve in the service that it is today.
 
Mike, health & safety of yourself, was usually assigned to the guy(or gal, today), to your left , or your right,... & you reciprocated, (that's almost a longer word than wheelbarrow!), ...:lol:, these days it's an arse covering excersise, usually involving the book being passed "parcel like" to some poor unsuspecting git!
 
I couldn't agree more, unfortunately some people have lost sight of what they signed on for when they took the shilling.
 
There is an answer to all this H&S claptrap and I use it at work all the time ( I have done a personal risk assesment and consider there is little or no risk and I am going to do it MY way )
 
I can't quite agree with you there Sikadog because I happen to think that most (not all) of the H&S legislation is corect it's just that people read things into it that aren't intended or don't use even a little bit of common sense. I do however think that there are some jobs where putting yourself in the way of possible harm in order to save others is what the job is all about. The secret is to limit the risks though.
 
Before the great H&S cockup one of my jobs was repairing pallet racking in warehouses,this I did for 10-15 years and then along comes the health and safety man and tells me I cant do it like that because its dangerous, what made it more dangerous than 15 years ago, just a guy with an office who cant do what I do, but because he has a bit of paper that tells him he passed an exam a monkey could have passed he thinks he knows everything.
I am also a safety officer that passed the same damn stupid exam, but who was the dick that set the exam in the first place, who told him how to do his job.
 
Redlab I wouldn't use the U.S. as a good example as there have been some terrible cases in the past where well intentioned firefighters have come to grief due to lack of suitable training and equipment and some of these cases have been filmed and are used as examples of how not to do it when carrying out water rescue training. You have to remember that a lot of fire departments in the U.S. are volunteers and only receive limited training but in other areas the kit and training provided simply cannot be matched by anything we have in this country. I was lucky towards the end of my career the brigade that I worked in had very good water rescue kit and provided good training for water rescues at different levels but not up to rescue swimmer level.
 
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Surely the British Fire Brigade is also manned by volunteers - or are they conscripts?

As for the training, the personnel from that paricular incident had also, obviously, only recieved 'limited training' - it says so, they were only trained to 'level one' - ie. kiddies inflatable paddle pool depth!

I tend to err on the side of "What the f"*) is all this H & S ********" about? When did it become "law" rather than jus legislation? I t was originally intended as a setof guidelines, to remind people that they had a moral obligation to not endanger other people by their actions (or inactions).

It has now become corrupted, with all the "experts" who, as a previous post mentions, seem to just delight in making life more difficult for individuals and businesses.

As a truck driver, I see examples of H & S almost daily on motorways - two cars have a very slight bump, and get onto the hard shoulder, traffic slows but continues to move, then the police turn up, and the whole motorway grinds to a halt! Whilst I agree that they have a right to work in as safe a manner as possible, they just take the p*ss!
 
Surely the British Fire Brigade is also manned by volunteers - or are they conscripts?

As for the training, the personnel from that paricular incident had also, obviously, only recieved 'limited training' - it says so, they were only trained to 'level one' - ie. kiddies inflatable paddle pool depth!

I tend to err on the side of "What the f"*) is all this H & S ********" about? When did it become "law" rather than jus legislation? I t was originally intended as a setof guidelines, to remind people that they had a moral obligation to not endanger other people by their actions (or inactions).

It has now become corrupted, with all the "experts" who, as a previous post mentions, seem to just delight in making life more difficult for individuals and businesses.

As a truck driver, I see examples of H & S almost daily on motorways - two cars have a very slight bump, and get onto the hard shoulder, traffic slows but continues to move, then the police turn up, and the whole motorway grinds to a halt! Whilst I agree that they have a right to work in as safe a manner as possible, they just take the p*ss!
AAHhh but you have it slightly askew here!,It's not plod who turn up & make a mountain out of a molehill, it's those "Traffic officers!"
 
Was not a firefighter disciplined by his own management for rescuing a drowning person from the Tay ?

He was not 'trained' so therfore should have stood by and watched the poor devil sink IIRC.
 
I think you have be careful not to let things slide off point onto discussions about H&S (which is another and frequently ludicrous discussion).

Putting aside the fact that they were employed to rescue others, 25 people watched another human floating face down in the water and did nothing - even the policeman and paramedic who (to their credit) reportedly wanted to rescue him accepted an order to do nothing - despite the fact that it was a toy boat pond.

I have the privilege of knowing several firefighters and I have no doubt that they would resign instantly rather than follow an order to do nothing in that situation. We should quite rightly praise the courage and dedication of the emergency services when that praise is deserved - however, you accept a responsibility when you choose to join and failing in that responsibility is equally deserving of condemnation. These people tarnish the reputation of their colleagues who, day in and day out, do their utmost for others.
 
Anyone else notice that the reporter, in his photo captioned "No Danger" of him stood in still, knee deep water, still insists on wearing a life jacket?
 
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