The Occupational Safety Consultants Register (OSCR)

A new national register of occupational safety consultants will be set up to help employers access good quality, proportionate advice, the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has confirmed. The Occupational Safety Consultants Register (OSCR) will go live in January 2011. It will provide firms with details of consultants who have met the highest qualification standard of recognised professional bodies and who are bound by a code of conduct that requires them to only give advice which is sensible and proportionate.

The register has been developed by HSE and a network of professional bodies representing safety consultants across Britain. Employers will visit a single website that help them to find local advisers with experience relevant to their sector.

Judith Hackitt, the HSE chair, said: "Lord Young quite rightly recognised that businesses find it difficult to know when they need expert safety advice and where to go to get it. The Occupational Safety Consultants Register will make it easier to identify consultants who meet the highest standards within their professional bodies. There are already many very good safety consultants who give sensible advice to employers - the register will help recognise their professional skills and also encourages those who do not yet meet these standards to do so. It will help to raise the standard of advice available to employers and increase their confidence in the advice they receive."

To be eligible to join the register, individual consultants will need to be either Chartered members of the safety bodies IOSH, CIEH or REHIS or a Fellow of the IIRSM. Membership will mean they have a commitment to continuous professional development, a degree equivalent qualification, two years' experience, professional indemnity insurance and are bound by a code of conduct to only providing sensible and proportionate advice.

The scheme will be managed by the professional bodies themselves through a not-for-profit company, with HSE providing support. Membership of OSCR will be voluntary. There will be an annual administration fee to be paid, although the level has yet to be set. A further announcement on the detail of the scheme will be made later in the year.

Burton Mail Business Awards 2010 - Results

Corporate Risk Systems - in its first year of entry - was delighted to have been shortlisted in two categories for the finals of the Burton Mail Business Awards 2010. Nominated as 'Best Small Business' and 'Best Green or Environmental Initiative' (for its pioneering carbon reduction and offsetting strategy over the last five years) across the East Staffordshire and South Derbyshire, the awards dinner was held at the home of Burton Albion FC, the Pirelli Stadium on 21 October 2010. CRS was represented by Stephen Asbury, MD and Andrew Arkinstall, Head of Training.



Paul Peschisolido, Manager of Burton Albion, a former Canadian international player who scored 118 goals in 447 appearances at English Football League clubs collected an award on behalf of Burton Albion for 'Best Performance which has raised the profile of East Staffordshire and South Derbyshire'.

[caption id="attachment_104" align="aligncenter" width="300" caption="Paul Peschisolido and Stephen Asbury, MD of CRS"][/caption]

In the awards ceremony, CRS was delighted to have been awarded 'Runner Up' in both of the categories it was nominated for. Stephen said "It has been a very good evening for our region where a broad range of individual and organisational talent has been showcased. We were very pleased to have been a small part of it, and very happy to have been recognised for our contributions in our region, our country and worldwide. We draw great energy from these two awards, and it spurs us on to higher and greater things in the future".

[caption id="attachment_105" align="aligncenter" width="300" caption="Stephen and Andrew with the awards presented to Corporate Risk Systems Limited"][/caption]



The Lord Young Report – Common Sense Common Safety

It seems to all of us at CRS that there seems to be more positives than negatives in Lord Young’s report on health and safety.

The report, called ‘Common Sense – Common Safety’ was released on Friday 15 October 2010 following a Whitehall-led review of health and safety laws and the growth of the compensation culture.

The positives to come out of the report include:

• Recognition that “good health and safety is vitally important” and that the Health and Safety at Work Act has led to an “enviable record” on safety
• The so-called compensation culture is a problem of “perception rather than reality”
• Acknowledgement of the need for health and safety consultants to be well-qualified and experienced (we see all-to-often what happens when ‘cowboys’ try to advise)
• More transparency about local authority decisions and for the public to be able to appeal against these.

The potential concerns from Lord Young’s report include:

• The potential to lessen RIDDOR reporting
• Employers may be exempt from risk assessments for “low hazard” workers such as home workers and those self-employed
• It doesn’t tackle the need for better education and management skills
• It doesn’t tackle the ‘silly safety’ stories published by media which discredit sensible health and safety management

The report also includes four consultations where IOSH members and the public can contribute. These include:

• RIDDOR
• Implementing improved systems for assessing health and safety standards for larger organisations
• Consolidating the current array of health and safety legislation into a single set of ‘accessible’ regulations
• Reform of civil justice and compensation

New government consultant register

The new government register for safety consultants is likely to be announced soon, as part of a package of recommendations under the Lord Young review into health and safety in the UK.

Plans to regulate safety consultants had been under discussion before Lord Young began his review, but his widely voiced concerns resulted in the scheme development being pulled forward by the Health and Safety Executive. The register is now scheduled for launch early next year.

IOSH members working as safety consultants will have to be Chartered to join the scheme. While the register is voluntary, Lord Young has made no secret of the fact that if it doesn’t succeed in raising standards, the government will look at making it statutory.

This new national register will be the only independent, HSE–backed scheme for safety consultants. The HSE has made it clear that it will be referring businesses to consultants on the register. We recommend that if you’re Chartered and working as a consultant, you should join the scheme. We’re still waiting for some of the details to be settled, including how much it will cost to join and stay on the register, but know that the HSE is keen to keep costs down, to cover administration only.

If you’re a Graduate currently working towards Chartered status, we’d encourage you to continue your development so that you’ll be able to join the scheme later. If you need help with the IPD process, then please get in touch with IOSH’s Membership team on 0116 257 3198, membership@iosh.co.uk – the team will be pleased to give you the support you need.

SCOTLAND, GLASGOW, OCTOBER 8 2010. ENGLISH CHANNEL COLLISION BENZENE TANKER BEING TOWED BY TUG

The YM Uranus struggles off the French Atlantic coast, 8 October The YM Uranus was bound for the Netherlands.

A chemical tanker which collided with a cargo ship off France's Brittany coast overnight is being towed to a French port, officials say. A French salvage team boarded the YM Uranus which was attached to a tug boat at 1100 French time (0900 GMT), the ship's operator told BBC News. None of the 6,000 tonne cargo of Heavy Pygas gasoline escaped, V Ships said. The tanker is said to have taken on water and the crew have been winched to safety by a French helicopter. It was said earlier to be listing badly to port after its collision with the Panamanian-flagged Hanjin Rizhao, 50 nautical miles (100km) south-west of the French island of Ouessant, which is at the mouth of the English Channel. The Channel is one of the world's busiest shipping lanes, with more than 400 vessels using it daily, and collisions continue to happen despite use of a radar-controlled traffic separation system. Heavy Pygas (pyrolysis gasoline) is a product of ethylene manufacturing and contains a large amount of the industrial solvent benzene.

'Favourable Situation'

Aude Flambard, a press officer at France's Atlantic Maritime Prefecture in Brest, confirmed to the BBC News website that the YM Uranus was under tow, and was not expected to reach port until the evening. We're in more of a favourable situation than an unfavourable one" She said the Hanjin Rizhao (initially identified by officials as the Hanjin Richzad) had proceeded on its way because it had not been damaged in the collision. Travelling from
Porto Marghera in Italy to Amsterdam in the Netherlands, the YM Uranus collided with the Hanjin Rizhao in darkness, France's AFP news agency reports. The Hanjin Rizhao had been travelling between Las Palmas in Spain and Rotterdam in the Netherlands, reportedly with a cargo of steel. V Ships spokesman Pat Adamson told the BBC News website that the YM Uranus had been struck on the stern by the other, much larger ship. No Heavy Pygas had escaped, he said, adding that while the gasoline was flammable, it would quickly evaporate in the event of a spill. The 13-strong crew of the YM Uranus took to liferafts at around 0330 GMT, from which they were winched to safety by a French helicopter and taken to a military base south of Brest. Maritime officials quoted by AFP said the ship had taken in "large amounts of water". The French coastguard said later that they had started to pump some of the water out, and no pollution was visible. "We're in more of a favourable situation than an unfavourable one," maritime authority spokesman
Marc Gander told journalists in Brest. He estimated it would take the tug and the tanker between 12 and 13 hours to reach port.

'No Imminent Threat'

Peter Bullard from Falmouth Coastguard in the UK said no pollution had been reported.

It'd be foolish of me to say that pollution would never reach us but there's certainly no imminent threat" "There's certainly no imminent threat," he told BBC Radio Cornwall. "It'd be foolish of me to say that pollution would never reach us but there's certainly no imminent threat. And that's not our concern at the moment." Mr Bullard said the UK Coastguard's role at this stage was chiefly to assist their French colleagues. "But obviously, the environment is of interest to all of us whether it's the French coast or
ours," he added.

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A round-up of recent successful prosecutions by the Environment Agency.

Waste offences

Suspended prison sentence for owners of a skip company in Bolton
Waste site owners prosecuted for breaching permit conditions

Wine company fined for waste packaging offences
A wine importation and distribution company has been ordered to pay more than £8,300 in fines and costs for failing to comply with waste packaging regulations.

Frozen dessert company fined for packaging offences
Tring company ordered to pay £26,615.00 after failing to register as a producer of packaging waste, and recover and recycle packaging waste.

Former waste company boss fined for failing to remove stockpile of waste
South Devon businessman Anthony Small has been ordered to pay £13,500 in fines and costs for failing to remove thousands of tonnes of waste from a site near Newton Abbot

Registered Waste Carrier fined for dumping skip waste
Local waste carrier Richard Goodwin has been fined a total of £2,000 for illegally dumping building waste on land at Monkey Oak Farm at Rolster Bridge,  Harbertonford, Totnes, Devon.

Company director sentenced to two year conditional discharge
On 27 August 2010, Edward O’Neill, of Blacksmiths Close, Nether Broughton, Melton Mowbray pleaded guilty to three charges relating to the illegal dumping, keeping and shredding of tyres.

Pollution offences

Fined for petrol station leak
ROC UK and Esso have been fined £7,000 and £3,500 respectively after a fuel leak from a Cambridge petrol station and ordered to pay £2,000 and £2,983 in costs.