The construction industry is one of the biggest industriesin the United Kingdom, although most workers are employed by small companies employing less than
25 people. The construction industry carries out all types of building work from basic housing to offices, hotels, schools and airports. In all of these construction projects the Electrotechnical Industry plays a major role in designing and installing the electrical systems to meet the needs of those who will use the completed buildings.
The construction process is potentially hazardous and many construction sites these days insist on basic safety standards being met before you are allowed on
site. All workers must wear hard hats and safety boots or safety trainers and use low voltage or battery tools. When the building project is finished, all safety systems
will be in place and the building will be safe for those who will use it. However, during the construction period, temporary safety systems are in place. People
work from scaffold towers, ladders and stepladders. Permanent stairways and safety handrails must be put in by the construction workers themselves.
When the electrical team arrives on site to, let us say, ‘first fix’ a new domestic dwelling house, the downstairs floorboards and the ceiling plasterboards will
probably not be in place, and the person putting in the power cables for the downstairs sockets will need to step over the floor joists, or walk and kneel on
planks temporarily laid over the floor joists. The electrical team spend a lot of time on their hands and knees in confined spaces, on ladders, scaffold
towers and on temporary safety systems during the ‘first fix’ of the process and, as a consequence, slips, trips and falls do occur.
To make all working environments safer, laws and safety regulations have been introduced. To make your working environment safe for yourself and those
around you, you must obey all the safety regulations that are relevant to your work.
The many laws and regulations controlling the working environment have one common purpose, to make the working environment safe for everyone.
Let us now look at some of these laws and regulations as they apply to the Electrotechnical Industry.
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Trevor Linsley