East Midlands CDM Update - Lincoln

Thirty Five members and guests attended the presentation on CDM 2007 given by Principal Construction Inspector Mrs Pearson of the Health and Safety Executive Midlands’ Area. Mrs Pearson, a resident of Lincolnshire is responsible for the County areas of Lincolnshire, Leicestershire, Nottinghamshire, Derbyshire and Rutland (Thought she did stress that she was still looking for something to inspect in Rutland), running a team of 12 inspectors and technical inspectors.

She illustrated and described the overall regulations briefly, explaining the emphasis that the HSE were placing on the interpretation, encouraging Clients, Contractors, Sub-Contractors and the workforce to properly communicate. Above all she stressed the regulations were not a paper generating procedure, organisations had to decide for themselves what records they needed to keep, to comply with legislation, however CDM required  three documents which she and her colleagues’ would seek out as evidence of a well managed site. The F10 notification, the Construction Phase Plan and the Project Plan as evidence of management control at all levels.

The key aims of CDM 2007 is to integrate Health & Safety into the management of a project, improving the planning and management from the outset, identifying risk early on, targeting efforts into where they can do the most good in terms of Health & Safety, and discouraging unnecessary bureaucracy. Health & Safety should be an essential but normal part of a projects development, not an afterthought or bolt on.

The CDM coordinator was defined as possibly not a single individual, but a role equipped with suitable experience at each phase of the project, and should be experienced professionals recruited from the industry.

Welfare was a mandatory provision on all modifiable sites, prior to work starting, as Principle Inspector Pearson stated we are now in the 21st Century, failure to provide will result in a prohibition being raised. Evidence historically points to better provision of Welfare inducing a more proactive attitude to Health and Safety on sites.

Question time revealed that the Designers were not directly covered by CDM; however they were tasked with ensuring there was one safe method of undertaking construction and this was accurately detailed on the drawings. The method does not have to be the most cost effective.

A further question revealed the HSE were accompanying local Building Control inspectors to visit small contractors as a method of improving the attitudes and awareness of dangers and how to control them as an ongoing theme.

In summary CDM will help you to improve Health & Safety in the industry and ensure the right people are in the right place at the right time to manage the risks on site. The focus should be on effective planning and management of risk starting with the clients, managing the actual risks not production of paperwork.

CDM 2007 is applicable to all construction projects of 30 days duration or over, and or 500 man hours or more.

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