Health and Safety Executive/Local Authorities Enforcement Liaison Committee (HELA)

To: Directors of Environmental Health/Chief Environmental Health Officers of London, Metropolitan, District and Unitary Authorities and Chief Executives of County Councils.

This circular provides information to LA Health & Safety Enforcement Officers, HSE Inspectors and Health and Safety Awareness Officers (HSAOs) carrying out Programme-directed inspections and follow up work on Watch Your Step under the Fit3 Slips and Trips Programme. This work forms part of planned delivery of the Fit3 Strategic Delivery Programme by HSE and LAs.

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Slips and Trips 2006-07 -
planned inspection and follow-up work to watch your step

Introduction

The purpose of this Programme-directed inspection work is to carry out interventions in those sectors with a high number and incidence rate of slips and trips injuries. The aim is to bring about a reduction in accidents caused by slips on wet or contaminated floors or by trips over obstacles/ on uneven or damaged floors.

Intervention overview

In 2006/07 interventions directed by the Slips and Trips Programme will take the form of:

• Proactive inspection and enforcement by HSE inspectors at medium-large premises in target sectors, including those large organisations which are included in central initiatives.
• Advisory visits by HSAOs at smaller premises, and publicity and promotional work, such as organising workshops, as a follow-up to Watch Your Step.
• LA inspections in target sectors and occupations.
• Investigation of accidents selected according to established criteria.

Note that this circular does not address slips and trips in food manufacturing which is the subject of a separate project for HSE.

The feedback and evaluation during Phase 1 (See http://www.hse.gov.uk/watchyourstep/newsletter1.pdf 55KB) and Phase 2 of Watch Your Step (December 2005 to March 2006) will inform follow-up activity in 2006/08. Further information will be placed on the HSE slips and trips Intranet site and on the HELA Extranet when it becomes available.

Dependencies

The S&T Programme (and as a consequence this project) has a number of dependencies on other FIT 3 programmes, in particular those which focus on MSD, Falls from Height, Workplace Transport and Public Services. The Business Group Delivery Plans (BGDPs) permit inspections and events on slips and trips to be combined with work under other programme topics as indicated by each plan.

Targeting of inspections

6 In HSE, Programme-directed inspections on slips and trips are part of the Manufacturing BGDP. They will target known hazards and industries in sectors, which have been chosen on the basis of high number and incidence rate of slips and trips major injuries, i.e.:

• fabricated metal products, SICs 2811, 2851, 2852, 2875, 2921
• wood and furniture, 36110 – 36150
• printing and publishing, 2221 and 2222
• rubber and plastics, 25110- 25240.

HSE field teams should target the largest premises available in the area, any that local knowledge indicates have the highest injury rates, those with risk control indicator (RCI) S&T scores of 3 or 4, or those not visited in the last two years. A list of premises where RCI scores of 3 or 4 have been recorded has been made available to divisions.

For LAs, the target sectors for the Watch Your Step campaign were:

• retail of bread/cakes
• food retail
• hotels
• canteens
• hardware stores
• builders merchants
• storage and warehousing.

As these sectors were chosen on the basis of accident data it is recommended that they continue to be the main focus of LA inspections on slips and trips. Additionally, floor cleaning operations are known to cause many accidents to cleaners and pedestrians and therefore merit inclusion in this programme. HSE and local authorities in the Midlands are carrying out a specific slips/ trips project on cleaning this year. OM 2006/05 refers: http://www.hse.gov.uk/foi/internalops/fod/om/2006/05.pdf [90KB].

Slips and trips inspections carried out in any other sectors, e.g. where slips and trips were not the main focus of the inspection, also count towards this programme.

Inspection and Enforcement

Considering the amount of publicity and information which has been produced on this topic since 2000, including the Watch Your Step campaign, duty holders should now be taking slips and trips seriously and should have carried out risk assessments and put controls in place. Premises found with workplace conditions which are likely to give rise to slips and trips should be dealt with robustly. The rate of enforcement on this topic is still low compared to that on the other priority topics.

Inspection/enforcement guidance is given in the regulator’s toolkit, which was produced for Watch Your Step. The toolkit updates the sections in the slips and trips topic inspection pack on legal requirements, control measures, enforcement and notice templates.

See https://extranet.hse.gov.uk/C5/HELA20/default.aspx (login required)

The topic pack includes information on the management of slips and trips, an inspection aide memoire and inspection check lists. It can be found at:

https://extranet.hse.gov.uk/C5/HELA20/default.aspx (login required)

For the printing industry the main hazards and controls are set out on HSE’s printing web site (slips and trips module). See http://www.hse.gov.uk/printing/slips/index.htm.

Large organisations

Interventions with large organisations, e.g. under the Field Operations Interventions with Large Employers initiative (FOILE), the Large Organisation Project Pilot (LOPP), and the Lead Authority Partnership Scheme (LAPS), should result in the production of an agreed improvement plan. Where slips and trips are an issue the plan should include key performance indicators on slips and trips.

Advisory visits, publicity and promotional work

Within the target sectors, HSAOs should cover slips and trips at their advisory visits to small businesses. Where resources permit, HSE/LAs should consider organising awareness-raising events (e.g. workshops) for duty holders to reinforce the Watch Your Step messages. These may be designed to include other Programme topics. For reference, reports of some Watch Your Step events run by HSE, LAs and stakeholders themselves are available at https://extranet.hse.gov.uk/C5/HELA20/default.aspx. Supporting information for HSAOs doing advisory visits on slips and trips is on the HSE Intranet.

Information resources

A suite of publicity materials and Power Point presentations to aid the running of events was developed for Watch Your Step. Remaining items can be obtained via the HSE divisional contacts for Watch Your Step. These contacts may be able to obtain further copies from Dave Dawick in HSE’s Communications Delivery Service (CDS2).

Stakeholder’s toolkits (MISC 692), posters (MISC 691 M-R) and, in particular, CD-ROM's (MISC 691K), may still be available. The CDROM contains resources for educational/promotional work, including the Power Point presentations, Worksmart video clips, case studies and other guidance. The presentations are also on https://extranet.hse.gov.uk/C5/HELA20/default.aspx

The Watch Your Step flyer (MISC 691B) is a single-page document summarising the HSE/LA approach to controlling slips and trips. It is available as hard copy and is suitable for handing out to duty holders and employee representatives during interventions.

The Watch Your Step web pages include posters which can be customised by employers, safety reps. etc. to meet their own requirements. See http://www.hse.gov.uk/watchyourstep/.

Additional guidance materials are also available on the HSE web site at http://www.hse.gov.uk/slips/information.htm.

Training

No additional training should be required for HSE staff that have attended the one-day slips on the level training, which was provided in each division during 2004. For staff who have not had this training, it is planned to hold additional courses in July, September and January 2006/07, and details of these will be circulated to divisional development managers.

Since 2000, training on slips and trips has been delivered by HSE to LAs through a large number of roadshows, practical workshops and briefings on topic inspections and Watch Your Step. However, for any LA inspector who still requires training, it is planned to run a small number of courses from autumn 2006. To register an interest in attending, please use the E-mail helpline in para 31.

Reporting by HSE staff

HSE inspectors should record their findings on the inspection report form (IRF), following guidance in the relevant work recording OM. A standardised approach has been agreed for reporting Fit3 interventions. The information collected, along with work recording data, will be used in quarterly reports for Fit3. The approach involves:

• The mandatory use of IRFs from 2 April 06.
• Answers to 3 questions to be included within the ‘note details’ associated with the relevant service order on COIN for each Fit3 topic covered at the contact, for those organisations which score an RCI of 3 or 4.

The 3 questions cover:

1. action taken (e.g. advice, IN, PN)
2. reason for the action taken, i.e. what was the non-compliance or where was there room for improvement?
3. outcome, i.e. what improvement has been achieved? The slips and trips inspection guides contain the context to these questions, e.g. benchmark standards expected.

HSAOs should follow the FOD guidance on COIN reporting, being sure to record fully: i.e. wherever slips and trips are discussed the activity and category on COIN should be completed, e.g. activity (advice) and category 'SLTR' (slips and trips).

Reporting activity and impact by LA staff

When planning and implementing work within the Fit3 programme it is essential to feedback details of activities and outcomes. This is to allow monitoring of progress towards the Slips & Trips Programme objectives and and where necessary to refocus work activities and to consider the adequacy of current support. Feedback also provides invaluable information for the Health & Safety Commission/HSE & LA Enforcement Liaison Committee/Local Authority Unit when responding to Ministers and the Local Better Regulation Office (LBRO) on the achievements of the LA/HSE partnership in delivering the Slips & Trips programme and the Fit3 programme in general.

Please use one or more of the following ways to record your activities and achievements both quantitatively and qualitatively:

• provide information via the 'in year' reporting form available on the Extranet (LAs will be e-mailed a link to this in advance of the reporting date)
• provide feedback ‘in year’ to Partnership Teams
• complete the topic inspection report forms on the HELA Training Co-ord website
• upload information onto the Extranet e.g. as an example of good practice
• contribute to research based evaluation work (if requested)
• apply for HELA annual awards
• complete the LAE1 form for 06/07.

Other planned slips and trips work outside this project

Inspectors and HSAOs should be aware of the following projects, which are also running during 2006/07:

• Midlands floor cleaning accidents project – HSE and LAs. See OM 2006/03 and LAC 77/3.
• Reducing slips and trips in the health services
• Slips, trips in prisons – series of seminars by the Slips and Trips Programme, largely completed in 2005/06
• Targeted inspection campaign of food industries ‘worst performers’.
• Royal Mail project – Royal Mail Letters UK – Health and Safety Management System Inspections Programme 2006/06
• Moving Goods Safely II – Joint initiative between HSE and local authorities
• Inspection intervention in the waste/ recycling industry

Further information

For queries on this work programme LA inspectors should contact their Partnership Teams.

The slips and trips helpline slipstripshelp@hse.gsi.gov.uk enables requests for advice and support on slips and trips interventions to be directed to a member of the Slips and Trips Programme Team.

For queries on this circular contact John Worth, HSE Safety Unit, 0161 952 8401. E-mail john.worth@hse.gsi.gov.uk