The Health and Safety Executive for Northern Ireland (HSENI) will be carrying out an inspection initiative focusing on machinery guarding, safe isolation and maintenance procedures across Northern Ireland Concrete Premises from 13 November through December 2023.
HSENI inspectors will be visiting concrete premises to ensure that machinery is adequately guarded to prevent access to dangerous parts. Inspectors will be checking that operators have adequate procedures in place for safe isolation and lock-out of equipment, and reviewing the measures in place to ensure both routine and non-routine maintenance can be carried out safely.
Speaking on the upcoming campaign, HSENI Principal Inspector Brian Pryce said: “Machinery guarding, isolation and maintenance activities remain a major risk for the sector. Our key message is to prevent access to dangerous parts of machinery, and to develop, implement and supervise appropriate procedures for carrying out maintenance (i.e. isolation and lock-out).
“In the past two years two fatal incidents have occurred at concrete premises involving work equipment. Our Inspectors will be checking that adequate arrangements are in place to guard dangerous moving parts of work equipment, and that suitable procedures are in place to safely complete both routine and non-routine maintenance.”
HSENI Inspectors will be providing information and advice during the inspection initiative. Where significant risks are found, Inspectors may take enforcement action in order to achieve compliance with health and safety legislation and to ensure that the risks are properly managed.
The inspection pro-forma which will be used by Inspectors during these inspections can be found at: www.hseni.gov.uk/publications/inspection-proforma-concrete-premises
Practical guidance on how you may ensure the safe use of work equipment on your site can be found in L22- ‘Safe use of work equipment’ This is available at: Safe use of work equipment. Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998. Approved Code of Practice and guidance L22 (hse.gov.uk).
Operators are further directed to the following HSENI Information Sheets:
- HSENI Information Sheet- Guarding Return Idlers – www.hseni.gov.uk/guarding-return-idlers
- HSENI Information Sheet- Safe cleaning and maintenance procedures for truck mounted mixing drums- www.hseni.gov.uk/safe-cleaning-and-maintenance-truck-mounted-mixing-drums
