Asbestos Threat, Please Help

Seadogs_2010

Hello everyone
I need some advice regarding Asbestos please. I work for a local company and their is five of us, three tradesman, one site manager and the owner. The owner and the site manager know so little regarding health and safety its a disgrace.
Today the joiner came back after been on holiday and asked who had taken a ceiling down, it was me who had done it but he said I shouldnt have done as their was Asbestos boarding in it.
Ive never had an induction and I was not aware at all asbestos was present on site. We are stripping out a pub.
Ive been told by a freind the someone on site should have a asbestos licence or something along those lines.

Does anyone know any sites with rules and regulations for work and asbestos and does anyone have any advice on my situation please?

Thank you for reading this and thank you for any help

dmg24

This is a good place to start.

ohreally

You'll get useful information here...http://www.hse.gov.uk/asbestos/

You may want to give them a call....http://www.hse.gov.uk/notices/notices/notice_list.asp?rdoNType=&NT=&SN=F&EO=LIKE&SF=NSUM&SV=asbestos&ST=N

Marsh_Samphire

The law says that, if your job might bring you into contact with asbestos, your employer must train you how to recognise asbestos and what to do if you suspect it is present. Some work requires specialist contractors to remove it and it is possible, from the type of work you describe, that it may be the case here, as an old building like a pub is quite likely to have asbestos present in some form (e.g. insulation or pipe lagging).

Some employers know there is asbestos and carry on regardless to save time/money etc in getting a licenced remover.

Info here
http://www.hse.gov.uk/asbestos/hiddenkiller/index.htm

You can contact (anonymously if you wish) the local council environmental dept or the HSE (0845 3450055) to report a site where asbestos has been disturbed. It won't come back to you, because any member of the public who is concerned about any sort of building work that might have disturbed asbestos can report something.

The HSE can visit site unannounced and have legal power to shut work down, take samples and can prosecute if they find breaches of health and safety law.

So many people moan about excessive H&S when idiots ban conkers or hanging baskets, but it is this sort of thing that H&S law is aimed at - careless employers who put their staff at risk of mesothelioma and lung disease in later life.

dickydonkin

Seadogs_2010 wrote: »

Hello everyone
I need some advice regarding Asbestos please. I work for a local company and their is five of us, three tradesman, one site manager and the owner. The owner and the site manager know so little regarding health and safety its a disgrace.
Today the joiner came back after been on holiday and asked who had taken a ceiling down, it was me who had done it but he said I shouldnt have done as their was Asbestos boarding in it.
Ive never had an induction and I was not aware at all asbestos was present on site. We are stripping out a pub.
Ive been told by a freind the someone on site should have a asbestos licence or something along those lines.

Does anyone know any sites with rules and regulations for work and asbestos and does anyone have any advice on my situation please?

Thank you for reading this and thank you for any help

Obviously too late now - but has the material you disturbed actually been confirmed as an asbestos containing material (ACM) and if so, by whom?

It is possible that the brewery may have had an asbestos register for all of their properties containing ACM's and that is how the joiner was aware of it, however if indeed the panels did contain asbestos (most likely chrysotile -white asbestos), not only were you placing yourself at risk, but anyone in the vicinity of the materials - particularly if the panels were broken up.

I would also ask as to why either the brewery or the principal contractor responsible for the work did not inform your company that asbestos was within the vicinity you were working - I am assuming of course that the work being carried out is all above board and not 'done on the cheap' with a nudge and a wink.

Removing and disposing of asbestos is quite a time consuming and expensive exercise and by 'avoiding' appropriate measures can allow a builder to submit a more 'competitive' tender than a responsible company who does everything by the book - not that I am suggesting that this is the case here.

Whatever the circumstances on how the work was obtained, the company's actions were unbelievably reckless and irresponsible. If there was any indication of asbestos when working, then work should have stopped immediately.

Obviously, one needs to be familiar with the characteristics, applications and locations of where asbestos was used - this is down to training - blatantly lacking here - as it seems are so many other aspects of the building work.

Asbestos is taken so seriously that it even has its own legislation and the HSE will take such a disregard of regulations very seriously.

The only possible saving grace is that the material was not asbestos - I recently did a safety inspection on some student accommodation and discovered broken panels that had all of the characteristics of white asbestos - fortunately after a sample had been analysed in a lab, it turned out not to be an ACM.

Your company may get away with it - whether kids playing in the area it was illegally tipped or by you inhaling fibres while removing the tiles may not be so lucky - only time (a very long time) will tell!