Latest health and safety news

Caretaker/site manager health and safety training – November 2024

The Corporate Health and Safety Service team are pleased to announce that they will be running caretaker/site manager training for schools again this year in November, with session as shown below:

• 12 November (am) session will be general health and safety awareness
• 12 November (pm) session will be fire safety awareness
• 13 November (am) session will be legionella awareness
• 13 November (pm) session will be asbestos awareness

The cost of attending this will be £65 per person, per session.

If all four sessions are attended by the same person, a discounted rate of £220 will apply.

Schools who are signed up to the Enhanced Service Level Agreement, can use their free half day training place for one session, with the remaining sessions at a discounted rate of £55 each.

Please email caroline.james@southampton.gov.uk if you would like to book a place.

It is not too late to sign up for the Health and Safety Service Level Agreement (SLA)!

We encourage all Southampton City Council schools to sign up for the new 2024-2025 Service Level Agreement.

Ad-Hoc Services are available to purchase on demand for those who don't wish to sign up. Please contact our team for information.

The Corporate Health and Safety team would like to encourage all schools to start using their SLA package services.

Please contact our team to organise your yearly health and safety audit at your earliest convenience. All schools that have not had their health and safety audit in more that two years are required to have one carried out in this academic year.

It is highly important for all schools to ensure that all health and safety related guidelines and legislation are being followed and checked periodically.

Our team is fairly flexible and are here to help you with any health and safety issues you might encounter.

All other services offered in your SLA packages (Basic or Enhanced) are available for you to use such as:

• Access to HSMS; Sypol, HelpDesk; Radiation Officer ( secondary Schools only)
• Meet the Headteacher and Governors
• Support with Enforcing Authorities
• Training Courses
• Legionella reviews
• Risk Assessments reviews

And so on.

New guidance in process

The Corporate Health and Safety Service team is working presently on creating a new safe working procedure regarding guidance of use and disposal of lithium batteries. Please watch out for our future bulletins.

Health and Safety Executive news - RIDDOR reportable incidents in schools

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has updated the Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations (RIDDOR) reporting form for all incident/accidents. Therefore, please ensure all serious incidents that will need to be reported on HSE website contain clear information regarding the following:

• What was the work activity being undertaken at the time of the accident?
• What happened in the lead up to the accident?
• What were the environmental conditions at the time of the accident, for example, weather, temperature, lighting, floor/ground condition?
• What was the name and type of the machinery/equipment/substances involved in the accident?
• What action have you taken to prevent similar accidents occurring?
• Describe the nature of the injuries sustained
• Is there any other relevant information which describes what happened?

Important note: All of the above mentioned are new questions implemented in the RIDDOR Reporting form. Please ensure that all this information is clearly stated in the Health and Safety Management System (HSMS) reporting form in the managers' review section (comments box). Failure to receive this information means that the Corporate Health and Safety Service will not be able to submit a RIDDOR report in a timely manner.

New training courses announcement

The Corporate Health and Safety team are reviewing the training we offer and would like to invite schools to consider if there is any specific training which they feel may be suitable for face-to-face training. Some ideas we have considered already are:

• Working at Height – steps and ladders – suitable for site managers/caretakers?
• Slips, trips and falls – general staff training?
• Care of substances hazardous to health (COSHH) and Sypol – suitable for cleaners and site managers?
• Manual handling – suitable for site managers/caretakers?

If you have any training, which you feel might be appropriate for your school and which other schools may be interested in, please email caroline.james@southampton.gov.uk.

Important: If your school is interested in hosting any of the training courses and have a suitable room available with internet connection and a screen to connect to with a laptop, please contact us to organise this event. Ideally there should be toilets close by and provision of tea and coffee. In return, Corporate Health and Safety will offer one or two free training course places depending on the number of delegates the room can comfortably hold.

Southampton City Council is tendering for a long term water quality contract (including legionella risk assessment) and set out below are the main objectives of the council’s strategic objectives for this contract:

1. To reorganise the water quality compliance services and implement a sustainable, best practice, customer focussed and collaborative approach to the management of water quality compliance and standards
2. To procure and maintain a comprehensive record of Mechanical and Electrical (M&E) asset lifecycle condition
3. To successfully digitise all water quality compliance data and M&E asset management data
4. To implement and sustain the use of a online Logbook at each site by Responsible Building Occupiers

In line with strategic objectives (three and four) for the new water quality contract, the council intends to introduce an online logbook. This will be for recording water quality monitoring and the management of risk assessment data, such as uploading legionella risk assessments, water system schematic drawings and sampling results, and recording remedial actions and hot and cold water infrastructure planned preventative maintenance.

The online logbooks are located on the Technology Forge (TechForge) asset management cloud database and the use of the online logbook across the sites shall ‘go-live’ at the commencement of the new contract.

All sites having duties under the Control of Substances Hazardous to Health (COSHH) regulations which includes managing of legionella, will therefore need to migrate to using the online logbook as a matter of routine. This is in much the same way and for same purpose as sites are currently doing for the recording of control measures such as flushing of outlets in the existing logbooks.

The council has issued all sites with the TechForge log-in details and the sites will need to ensure that they are able to access the database. Please note however, thecCouncil is not in a position to provide access to laptops or mobile devices and these matters, if they are pertinent, must be resolved between the responsible persons on the site.

Arrangements shall be made prior to the commencement of the new contract to host a workshop for the sites. The council shall provide further updates in due course.

Hampshire & Isle of Wight Emollients Campaign

Please find the latest HIWFRS News - March 2024 and in particular the item covering the Emollients Campaign. There are a number of schools that have pupils who use emollients as part of their daily care and it is very important for all to read this news bulletin.

The Corporate Health and Safety Service (CHSS) provide Health and Safety Fire Risk Assessment Reviewer training, which is a half day course.

All schools who subscribe to the Enhanced Health and Safety Service Level Agreement (SLA) 2024/25 are entitled to a free training place. If you have already used this, you are entitled to a discounted rate of a £10 reduction in price for the first person (£99.20) and £20 reduction for all other delegates attending the same health and safety training course on the same day from the same school (£89.20).

For schools who have not subscribed to the Enhanced SLA, the cost is £109.20 per person.

Currently, this training is scheduled to run at the Civic Centre in Committee Rooms One and Two, starting at 9.30am on Friday 24 of May 2024.

If you have anyone who would like to attend this training, please contact Learning and Development to book a place. Please note, this training is scheduled for up to three hours and no refreshments are available, therefore please ensure all delegates bring a drink with them and a snack if necessary.

For any other health and safety training courses, please refer to the Learning and Development Intranet pages.

Service Level Agreement

It is not too late to sign up for the Health and Safety Service Level Agreement (SLA)!

We encourage all Southampton City Council schools to sign up for the New 2024-2025 SLA.

Ad-hoc services are available to purchase on demand for those who do not wish to sign up. Please contact our team for information.

The new Schools Health and Safety SLA packages for the academic year 2024/25 have been released.

Please note there is still time to sign up to this year’s Schools Health and Safety SLA.

Schools can sign up to the Schools Health and Safety SLA at any time of the year, however the SLA runs from 1 April to 31 March annually and therefore the earlier you sign up the more value you get!

The benefits of signing up are considerable and are offered as a basic service and an enhanced service:

The basic service provides access to the council’s online Incident Reporting system (HSMS), which allows the Corporate Health and Safety Service (CHSS) to track your accidents and incidents and, where necessary, offer appropriate support. It also provides guidance and support in relation to enforcing authorities, such as the Health and Safety Executive (HSE), especially in relation to Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations (RIDDOR) reporting and/or any interventions

The Enhanced SLA provides an opportunity for you and/or your governors to meet with someone from the CHSS to raise any queries relating to health and safety, and best practice. It also provides the opportunity for the school to receive a full audit each year to assist you with monitoring the effectiveness of your health and safety management systems and to provide you with assistance towards improving where necessary.

Both Health and Safety SLA packages provide a host of other benefits, including guidance and support from an experienced team of health and safety professionals towards assisting you in ensuring you are discharging your statutory and other health and safety responsibilities adequately.

For further information on the full benefits of both the basic and enhanced services, please view the SLA guidance. Please note, the new SLA also includes information regarding the Emergency Planning SLA, which may also be of interest to you.

If you have any questions or queries relating to the Health and Safety SLA, please do not hesitate to contact the CHSS for further information.

To sign up to any of the SLA’s, please email SLAs@southampton.gov.uk. 

Southampton City Council are now ready to go live with a new asbestos register called Keystone Mini. You can access ‘Mini’ now. This will replace the existing asbestos register and will serve both the council and all external parties that require access to the our asbestos register.

Keystone Mini will go live on Monday 26 February.

To find out how to use Keystone Mini please see the Keystone Mini Guidance document.

To request log in credentials please email Asbestos.RegulatoryService@southampton.gov.uk and include the email addresses of those that will require access.

Prior to any works that intrude and/or disturb the fabric of a building that was constructed before 2000, it is mandatory that you check the asbestos register to confirm that the area of proposed work has been adequately assessed for asbestos. If there is no evidence of prior asbestos checks that are specifically targeted to the work, you must request a survey. Requests for surveys must be logged via your Southampton City Council Project Manager or please email the Asbestos Team as above.

The Asbestos Team will be on hand to provide support and guidance with any asbestos information. If you would like to contact the team, please email Asbestos.RegulatoryService@southampton.gov.uk. The Asbestos Team will always respond as promptly as possible but if your request is urgent, please call 023 8083 2170.

Please note that following the switchover to Keystone Mini, the existing asbestos database system will be switched off.