October 9, 2006—The UK’s Health and Safety Executive (HSE) welcomed the recent launch of an initiative by the Electrical Contractors’ Association (ECA) and the Heating and Ventilating Contractors’ Association (HVCA) that helps member contractors meet health and safety competences.
Many contractors undergo “pre-qualification” assessments from clients and major contractors when tendering for work; these assessments look for evidence of contractors’ basic health and safety credentials, says HSE.
Sometimes contractors are required to prove these competencies for each job they tender for.
To address this issue HSE commissioned a study by J Z Carpenter Ltd: “Developing guidelines for the selection of designers and contractors under the Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 1994, Research Report 422” (.pdf file). Based on the report’s recommendations, HSE initiated a consultation exercise with industry bodies to develop a set of core criteria that should be used to assess contractors.
The core criteria state clearly what contractors should be doing to meet basic health and safety requirements and are based on the key requirements in the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999, says HSE.
