Health and Safety
Executive / Commission
Construction
As a designer, you are in a unique position to reduce the health risks that arise from construction work, and you have an important role in helping to protect workers.
Early design decisions and assumptions affect health and safety because they influence the choice of materials and construction methods, and the build programme.
You need to understand how a design affects the health of the workers who will construct or maintain a structure. By identifying and assessing health risks, then taking action to eliminate hazards, reduce risks, and share information, you can reduce health risks to workers.
Thinking about heath risks in the early design stages of a project can help to avoid the need for expensive redesign once a scheme hits site.
Occupational health (as well as safety) should be an integral part of the design process. Remember to take a ‘whole-life’ approach when assessing risks - think about the maintenance, use and eventual demolition of the structure.
A competent designer should:
Construction industry designers are not legally obliged to prepare a risk register for health and safety, but a register can help to show that you have considered the risks. It may also help you share information with the client and contractors.
You need to be aware of REACH (Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation and Restriction of Chemicals). If your design relies upon a product(s) (particularly unusual or specialised ones) we recommend that you contact suppliers to find out if the chemical(s) contained in the product will be registered under REACH.
To identify hazards effectively, you need to know about the materials and processes that are likely to be used in the construction, maintenance, use and eventual demolition of a structure.
If you don’t have enough knowledge or experience of how to deal with a health hazard, you will need to consult others. For example, you might need to get advice from a specialist designer, contractor, consulting engineer, occupational health practitioner or the CDM coordinator.
As well as considering the properties of a material, you also need to know how it is likely to be used. For example, a hazardous substance or heavy component may pose a greater risk if it is handled or used in an enclosed area. Some health risks can be managed more effectively if a material or component is assembled in a factory environment, rather than on site. Off-site assembly can also improve quality.
Sometimes it makes sense to specify a material with a relatively high application risk because of the lower risks of maintaining the product over its lifespan - you should take a ‘whole-life’ approach to risk management and design.
Eliminating health hazards should be an integral part of the design process.
At routine design reviews, confirm that health hazards have been properly addressed. Also, project risk review gateways can link to RIBA (Royal Institute of British Architects) plan-of-work stages.
Make sure that eliminating one health hazard doesn’t create a new and more significant hazard.
Risk assessments should be systematic and structured, and solutions should be selected on the basis of the risk control hierarchy.
Red-Amber-Green lists can help designers identify and eliminate hazards, and control risks.
Hazardous products, processes and procedures to be eliminated from the project:
Products, processes and procedures to be eliminated or reduced as far as possible and only specified if there is no other option. The designer should provide information about these risks, and the reason for their selection:
Products, processes and procedures to be positively encouraged:
Make sure that information about residual risks reaches those workers who are likely to be at risk. You could use drawing notes, specifications and manuals or other suitable formats.
Highlight important design assumptions and any remaining risks that are not obvious.
If a project Design Risk Register is used, adapt it to provide a means of capturing remaining risks.
Where the project is notifiable, tell the CDM co-ordinator about the remaining risks, other than those that are trivial, so that the information can be added to the Health and Safety Plan and File.
