SafeWork NSW - Working at Heights

This episode of the Safety Cast is hosted by Principal Inspector, Belinda Orris. She's joined today by Kane Scott, one of our regional construction managers to discuss working at heights. Thanks again for joining us everyone. In this episode of the Safety Cast, we will be discussing working at heights with a focus today on roof work and the Safe Work New South Wales initiatives in this space. I'm joined today by my guest, Kane Scott, manager from our regional north construction team. Welcome Kane. I'm Belinda. Falling from any height can lead to death or long-term injuries. Falls from heights are a major cause of fatalities and serious injuries at work in New South Wales. Most people who are seriously injured or killed fall from a height of four metres or less. Ladders, incomplete scaffolds, falling off a truck, a roof edge or falling through fragile roof sheeting are the major causes of injuries. More than 12,000 workers were injured after falling from a height between 2014 and 2017. 25 died and more than 240 were permanently disabled, with these incidents largely occurring in the construction industry. Firstly Kane, what are the legal responsibilities for businesses and employees for managing the hazards and risks associated with working at heights? Yeah I mean so besides the general duty to keep workers safe in every workplace and the duty to consult with all of your workers around the hazards in their workplace, the work health and safety regulation does have specific requirements when it comes to working from heights. So firstly if you can perform the work from the ground or from a solid structure like a complete scaffold then you must do it that way. If that's not reasonable you can then implement a fall prevention system. It's the next level of control and if that's not reasonable then we get into our work positioning systems and fall arrest systems which are your your classical harness-based work. So the business needs to work through those control measures in that order and select the highest level of control. Okay and how can businesses and workers identify and manage the risks? You know certainly the most efficient way to identify risk is to dedicate some time to assessing it. So before you start a task, seat yourself aside with your workers to make sure you actually look at the task, look at the workplace, identify you know what can go wrong and certainly when it comes to falls from heights you get input from workers, talk to them, see if you can identify you know where things can go wrong. That's definitely the you know the most efficient and the most practical way to identify risks and determine your control measures. And then failing that if you sort of the knowledge is not there between you and your workers around how to control the risks then you can refer to the safe work codes of practice around falls from heights. So managing the risk of falls in workplaces and the specific code related to falls in construction, residential construction would be a good place to go to refer and if not you know seek advice from safe work inspectors, seek advice from your industry associations to come up with the best controls for the risks. Okay great. Can we discuss fall prevention options for a couple of different scenarios? Yeah so as we said the hierarchy of controls if we can't do it from the ground or a completed scaffold then we can use fall prevention. So fall prevention devices are things like roof edge protection, roof rail, also EWPs, elevated work platforms and scissor lifts and the like. So yeah to give you a couple of scenarios if you were doing a re-roof of a property where you needed to access the whole roof quite a complex task. If it wasn't able to achieve that with scaffolding in that you know existing property so there might be swimming pools, garden beds, fences, those types of things then you would look at a fall prevention so roof edge protection and have that installed so that when you're doing your complex task of replacing the roof workers aren't going to be exposed to a risk of fall off the edge of the roof and similarly if you needed to you know do some painting on the side of a property where you might be accessing via ladders and the likes where it might be more appropriate to use a scissor lift like an elevated work platform to access those areas. So if there's the high level controls available and it's reasonable then that's what you're required to use. Okay sure could you explain further work positioning and fall arrest systems? Yeah so work positioning system, fall arrest system I think the important point to note is that they're generally using all of the same equipment so a work positioning system according to the code of practice includes fall restraint which is where you'd be working on a roof wearing a harness connected to a lanyard and an anchor point that would prevent you from reaching either the edge or a void or a brittle surface that you could fall through so by its very nature it prevents you from falling and it sort of keeps you positioned in the area of the workplace where you're not exposed to that risk whereas a fall arrest system so still using essentially the same equipment so a harness connected to a lanyard, adjustable lanyard connected to an anchor point however the length of the lanyard or the adjustment of the lanyard is such that it doesn't prevent you reaching the edge or reaching a void or a brittle surface so they don't stop you from falling but they arrest your fall in that they prevent you from impacting the ground or you know a structure that was underneath. I think the important point to remember is that both of those systems so their work positioning so for restraint and fall arrest systems require a very high degree of training and they also rely heavily on worker behaviour just to achieve their effective use so once you introduce a work task to a harness based system of work of even mild complexity the ability to keep that system adjusted in and out and the ability to concentrate on both tasks at once generally makes them a very ineffective system of work for work at heights hence the reason that the work health and safety regulation calls them out as a very low level control in that if you can put a high level control that really prevents the worker allows them to concentrate on their task then they're required to use that system so for most roof tasks like replacing a roof, installing a solar system, painting or cleaning a roof so relying on a harness based system of work is not an effective control measure to prevent people falling from heights. Yeah sure we do still see a lot of incidents where they're using the harnesses we're also noticing a fair few incidents at the moment in relation to people working with fragile and brittle roofs what can you tell us about that? Yeah so the statistics definitely show that falls through roofs is a very serious problem and they also result in very serious injuries given that as they fall they're you know potentially injuring themselves on the way through you know being quite seriously injured they're impacting structures on their fall down and then also impacting the ground so it is exposing to a high level of risk high level of harm we're really needing to put physical controls in place to prevent those falls so again we come back to our identification before we access a roof area taking the time to identify and they're not always easy to see so you do get some discoloration in polycarbonate sheeting and the likes that may be asbestos roof sheeting whether your condition needs to be assessed but really it comes back to identifying all of the potential fragile brittle roof surfaces before you access the roof put the controls in in the highest order that you can so if you can put physical controls in place just relying or telling people not to walk on them is not an effective level of control whilst no one thinks that they will walk on them and fall through them our statistics show that it is occurring so putting physical barriers in place so whether they're timber or metal covers covering over skylights and the likes installing catch platforms catch scaffolds underneath them if required physically preventing people accessing though is definitely the highest level of control they may require removal and roof wire put in place they may require platforms installed to the roof to allow people to traverse rather than walking across fragile asbestos roof sheeting for example but yeah really identifying them physically preventing people accessing them and where possible implementing controls for future use so if you were removing some fragile brittle sheeting that didn't have roofing wire for example before you'd put another fragile sheet back in you'd be installing those controls for future use okay great ideas there let's talk about some administrative controls businesses can implement while on site yeah so obviously admin administrative controls again we're looking at the lower level controls however they're often used in conjunction with high level controls so certainly training is a good one so if you're going to be requiring your workers to implement a system of work this is especially important when it comes to harness based work need to make sure that your workers have the adequate training to safely undertake the task use the equipment they're being asked to use in the environment that they're being asked to use it ensuring their appropriate PPE so certainly footwear if you're going to be accessing work at heights areas ensuring that you have non-slip footwear and the likes that's another admin control and also exclusion zones are another admin control both for falls from heights and falling objects so you certainly should be preventing people from entering areas where they're exposed to risk especially when they don't need to be there if you're wanting to use an exclusion zone to prevent people being exposed to the risk of fall off an edge on a fairly flat roof for example you would be putting in an exclusion zone to keep them say three meters there's a minimum back from that edge where they could fall and again if you're going to rely on that admin control of an exclusion zone you really do need to put some barricades up to highlight and define that exclusion zone and potentially signage installed to identify that as an exclusion zone and when it comes down to admin controls actions speak louder than words so if you implement an admin control but again you're identifying that it's not being as effective to control the risk as you think you would be wanting to reassess that admin control and see whether you can move to a high level control to control that risk okay thanks what are some of the benefits to businesses when falls risks are managed effectively yeah I always look at safety is improving the overall output on a job so certainly good safety when it comes to work at heights can also improve efficiency and the quality but also the confidence and culture within your workplace if you were thinking if we if we take just one example if you were to if you were trying to re-roof a project and you were trying to do that out of harnesses as opposed to having a perimeter scaffold or roof edge protection where workers are trying to essentially undertake two tasks at once control the harness and also control the task of replacing the roof the efficiency of having a high level control workers are confident where they're working they don't have to be concerned about falling off the roof they don't they're not impeded by the use of harness and re-anchoring and anchor points and the likes they really can improve the efficiency of that project so they're what while there might be an initial upfront cost to implementing a high level control that can be regained through having a much more efficient system of work and also the quality of the work if you can purely concentrate on the task at hand without trying to run a full restraint system while doing your complex task then the quality of your task will be higher so again the cost benefit in terms of implementing a good control you'll get better quality out of your work not to mention that the effectiveness of a higher level control is going to keep your workers safe it's going to prevent injuries it's going to build the confidence in your workforce that you care about their safety and the outcome of the project it can improve the culture in your business you set a higher standard so the benefits of improved safety when we're working at heights you know they really do add to the quality efficiency and safety of the project yeah the benefits there are just endless it's really important to have that safety on site let's talk more broadly about ladder safety when accessing a roof space yeah so we do have a lot of falls from heights from ladders while accessing and a lot of times so certainly when inspectors attend job sites and we look at ladder accesses it's very common for us to see that the ladders aren't secured that they're not footed on stable foundations that they don't extend you know a meter past the landing to allow to exit and enter the ladder safely and I think people just take for granted if they lean a ladder up against something in climate and hold on they won't fall but again we attend a lot of incidents where people are falling from ladders they pretend quite serious incidents including fatalities where people fall from ladders and it really doesn't take a lot of effort to go from having something that's dangerous to something that's quite safe so you know footing your ladder on a stable ground footing your ladder away from incoming power lines securing your ladder so really making sure it's tied off nice and tight so that if when you do enter or exit the ladder you put a little bit of sideways force which is only natural you know that ladder's going to maintain its integrity same as with the footing if we installed at the correct angle which is one in four so for every four meters in height for example one meter out you can have that confidence that when you access the ladder on a solid foundation it's not going to slip out from underneath you we really shouldn't be looking at carrying equipment up ladders ladders are for access and egress only so if it can't be attached to your tool belt then you shouldn't be carrying it in your hands up and down the ladder if there's the option to install better access controls so that might be a mobile scaffold with internal access it might be a scaffold stair bay and again if we look at the efficiency so whilst there might be a slight upfront cost in putting a scaffold little access stair bay when you're doing a re-roof or a roofing project the fact that it allows you to have much safer access up and down much more efficient access up and down carry equipment up and down at the end that cost can be absorbed in the improved efficiency of your project so if we are going to use ladders we use them for access egress we make sure they're secured we make sure they extend a meter past the landing we make sure they're installed at the right um one to four angle and we make sure they're footed on a solid foundation. Do you have some tips on how businesses can ensure safe working at heights practices throughout the construction project? Yep so definitely planning of the job is a very important part planning when you're going to have your scaffold installed planning when you're going to have your roof edge protection installed the best tip I can give is to continuously talk to your workers dedicate that little bit of time each day be at 10 minutes at the start of the job to discuss what your plans are for that day identify where you're going to be exposed to risk when working at heights have the discussion up front when you're doing your planning how you're going to control those risks with the highest level control that you can again very common for us to see in construction workers up working outstanding on top plates installing roof trusses and the likes one day exposing their workers to very serious risks only to inquire and be advised that scaffold was supposed to come that day but now it's the next day so people again through a little bit of poor planning exposing their workers to very high risk where if they had a bit more forethought they would have those controls in place and not be exposing people to that risk listen to your workers ask them where they could fall likely to fall have nearly fallen make sure you continue to improve and seek out the high level to controls to prevent those things happening and the more you plan or the better you plan the more you talk to your workers then you're going to have the high level controls and the best opportunity to have the high level controls in place again if you're not really sure what's out there what's required how you can control the risks reach out again to safe work look at our codes of practice listen to our podcast look on our website reach out to your industry associations there's plenty of information out there technology is always improving industry is always improving there's a lot of areas you can go for help thank you can you think of any other areas that or places listeners can gather any additional information and resources safe work new south wales website is a great place to start we have a lot of resources there as I said the codes of practice we have guidance documents we have incident information releases we have the podcast we have youtube videos you can reach out to safe work for an advisory visit where you can have an inspector either visit your project or you can come and talk to an inspector and get information on how you can best control falls from height risks you can reach out to your industry associations for resources and then speak to your colleagues if you can share good ideas if you come up with a good idea be on the lookout for new and emerging technologies to help you in the work at height space thanks kane thanks for tuning in to this safety cast and very special thanks to my colleague and guest kane scott for sharing those insights regarding working at heights for more information on this topic and other topics please visit our website www.safework.nsw.gov.au if you see something out on site or need to report an incident phone 13 10 50 or use the speak up app please feel free to share this safety cast with your industry colleagues