I notice Speedy Hire is now doing an exchange deal for old and faulty ladders at its access depots.

Are faulty ladders a big problem, do people think?

I'm seeing ladders less and less on big sites anyway, so it's not a problem I'm especially aware of.

 

 

The ladder has been around for ever, there's nothing wrong with it, apart from this incessant and tiresome need for the H&S gurus to be changing everything and an unimaginable theory that we now have to ‘train' grown men how to climb one ???

Ladders were used by those attacking fortifications castles etc to climb over the walls and fight the castle inhabitants within. However, ladders had the disadvantage of leaving the man climbing the ladder subject to attack by arrow, boiling water or oil, or by being thrown to the ground if the ladder was pushed away from the wall. To prevent this type of attack the Belfry or Siege Tower was developed problem being, where do you store one of those when you're finished with it?

Ladders were used to convey so many brave men ‘over-the-top' in the First World War and Journalists and writers love the word ladder...

"Friedrich List, the leading German economist of the mid-19th century, argued that in this way the more developed countries wanted to "kick away the ladder" with which they climbed to the top and so deny poorer countries the chance to develop. After the second world war ...

Lying 45 rungs below Chelsea on the ladder of English football, they gave the champions less of a game than Macclesfield - then last but one in ... "I think the history of the game was the history of the first half," Jose Mourinho said, and that could best be told in its statistics. ...

Do you have any CCJ's or Adverse Credit History? ... I do not want further information from First Rung on the Ladder after the initial contact". ...

Nothing wrong with the ladder - keep it in good nick and use it correctly!

Bored now, going to the pub...with my ladder.

Molevalleyman,,, can i borrow your ladders so that i can paint my skirting boards plaese,,,, i would use mine but speedy said with so many missing rungs that they would not exchange them.

 

Unreal Rock..itt, another money-making scam - I'll pop it into the post for you but on receipt, you must ensure the following and take note of previous answers to that age-old problem:

• You will require special qualifications and be able to pass complicated examinations before undertaking any kind of work off the ground. (Some people have even got the idea that they can no longer use Skirting Board Ladders) This is, of course nonsense. There are, however, some simple procedures that need to be followed to comply with the regulations.
• What is Work at Height?
  Work at Height is defined as any work in any place from which a person could fall a distance liable to cause personal injury. This includes getting to and from a place at height, working at, above, or below ground. The regulations do not include permanent stairways or slips or trips on the same level but Skirting Board decoration is risky and should, if possible, be carried out from a suitable scaffold tower.
• What is meant by a competent person?
  A competent person is generally defined as someone who has the right level of, experience, knowledge and the appropriate qualifications to enable them to identify any risks arising from a situation and the measures needed to be taken to prevent harm.

Experience shows that falls from skirting boards usually occur as a result of poor management control rather than because of equipment failure.

Common factors include:

• Failure to recognise a Skirting Board.
• Failure to provide safe systems of work.
• Failure to use Skirting equipment correctly.
• Failure to ensure that safe systems of work are followed.
• Inadequate provision of information, instruction, training or supervision.
• Failure to use appropriate Skirting equipment.
• Failure to provide safe plant/equipment.

Also look here, they might well stock a Skirting Board Ladder -  http://www.david.zen.co.uk/toolstore/Online_Catalogue_Tools_4.html

My company produces a range of pre-use inspection systems for scaffolding, MEWPs, ladders, forklifts etc. Out of them all I would say that ladder inspections remain the most popular of our range (closely followed by forklifts). I guess people are still using them out there, and from my point of view long may they do so Drop me a line if you want to find out more or visit http://www.goodtogosafety.co.uk/ladder.php

 Its like living in a land of vampires!

Good to go!

Safety this! A 22RB has just broken its top line while balling a 5 story building!

The ball has just dropped into a hole in the 4th floor and the topline has just bounced off your cab!

How are you going to connect that ball to the topline?

 I'm not sure I'd be using a ladder in that situation!

 Exactly!

Your trying to make money on the life of someone else and you don't even have a clue!

Nor do you care as long as that cash passes your hands!

Not sure what your problem is. By the sounds of it, you would get rid of health and safety practices completely, in case anyone actually makes some money out of it. We designed and developed a system to help improve people's safety within a working environment and I'm proud to say that we have successful in doing so. I am as much a campaigner against unnecessary H&S policies as the next man, I'm of the age where you learn from your mistakes, however I don't simply bury my head in the sand and hope that nothing happens, I'd rather be proactive and stop an accident from happening in the first place, rather than pick up the pieces afterwards. I have witnessed the effects of serious injury in the workplace and seen lives ruined as a result (not just the injured party but his family and colleagues too). Thankfully there are plenty of people out there that welcome our efforts and happily implement safe systems of work rather than take the see no evil, hear no evil stance.

 If you were a non profit organisation i might believe you!

Untill then you are going to pump out whatever sells your product!

Forgive me for being sceptical but i don't believe a word of it!

Let me blow your good intentions to peices with two questions!

What are your profit margins!

Will you share your business details with the rest of us in the interest of safety?

Your here for the pound signs mate!

Don't try to patronise me into thinking you have my well being at heart!

 

 

 So I guess you don't wear seatbelts when you drive (a money making scheme by car manufacturers), you don't wear PPE (it might improve your chances of surviving an accident but why should you wear it if it is lining the pockets of those that manufacture them). I'm sorry, I just don't understand your argument. If you are in demolition work, do you do it for free, because you're offering a service to your customers? No, you charge them for the work you do and they get a safely demolished building for their payment (although I would question how safe it was done, going off your posts to date). Maybe you should simply do it as a non-profit organisation, that would be awfully charitable of you? We sell our systems at low cost to encourage as many people as possible to purchase - as a result they can ensure the safety of their operatives, reduce unneccesary maintenance costs, provide an audit trail, comply with legislation etc etc. We find that most comapnies implementing our system actually save themselves a considerable amount of time and money in the process. Yes, we make some money on the sale - that is what being in business is about - but it is not the underlying reason for developing the product. Whether you believe it or not is immaterial. 

 

I'm not sure that throwing our toys out of the pram (TOTOOTP for the graddies) is the right way forward here albeit, there's probably an ‘expert' just around the corner that will, no doubt advise me further on the dangers of doing so and maybe, they'll even supply me with some free pram labels?

Advertising on any forum is crap and promising to ‘safeguard' what is now a completely destroyed Construction Industry for monetary gain is worse still.

 So you do it for the money?

You don't care how many people die if they haven't paid you your fee?

If you look at my posts on here you will see i put myself out  (At no cost) for the benifit of the people who work in my industry!

I give my services for free when i can and don't abuse this site for a bit of free advertising trying to bullsh-t the members that i'm all righteous about it!

You would forfeight my live to preserve your profit!

I wouldn't do that to anyone!

  OK guys, apologies for trying to give some feedback on the question asked about faulty ladders, apologies for trying to help, apologies for the state of the construction industry etc, etc. Doesn't look like you are willing to believe a word I have said so I will simply stop the debate here and now. I am genuinely amazed at the response generated in all honesty, I am obviously too naive for the forum as I honestly thought I was helping. Lesson learned.

 Don't be like that mate!

We aint here just to bash people! (you did walk into it though)

We want answers so we are going to tear you to bits!

Its nothing personal but i do think its healthy!

Personally i think its cool of CS to let us ragg each other like this!

I know i'm learning a lot about other trades in this game because of it!

Give it time n you'll sus it out!

 

"I am obviously too naive for the forum as I honestly thought I was helping. Lesson learned."

Similar to our friend Supa, I too am aware that in a forum such as this, emotions - particularly when considering the current state that this industry is in, do and will get stretched but I have to say from my own point of view and having now worn most of the industries tee-shirts, from an apprentice Carpenter and Joiner to Senior Site Manager and onwards to Project Manager, I am at a complete loss in understanding where all of this so-called health and safety ‘expertise' is coming from and for what reason - although I can think of one - Money!

Everyone's an expert on Safety be it the Butcher, The Baker or indeed that guy that makes the candles.....but, a very serious and potentially dangerous fact remains, very few of those ‘experts' out there are actually able to demonstrate a practical understanding of what it is that they are endlessly preaching to us about but instead, are choosing to turn us all into form filling, monitor tapping label and sticker appliers, covered in Hi Viz uniforms?

It has to stop, clearly there are dangers attached to every occupation particularly in today's money-manic environment but the manner in which we are now supposed to confront risk is becoming pathetic, leave the H&SE to get on with what they have been doing very well for a long time but also lead from the front and get an independant / in-house Site Inspector, the H&SE or your Clerk of Works to ‘snag' your monitoring efforts - on a regular basis.

As a young General Foreman, I was taught that in order to identify risk, one has to go out there and ‘physically' inspect (for example) the scaffolding, checking the couplings, the putlogs, the guard railing, checking that the ladders are secured and in good shape, checking that the braces are in position and correctly configured, the scaffold register would be filled in accordingly and the scaffold could then be used, walk around your site and identify everything that you might have doubts about and if necessary close it off but, those inspections would be carried out when the site was shut, first thing in the morning or last thing at night. I maintained that diligence for many years as a General Foreman / Senior Site Manager and once I became a project Manager, I instilled that same routine / diligence into the young fellows who followed me, we reported no serious accidents anywhere and we did very well, without any of these ridiculous external Health and Safety Profit-mongering Gurus sticking their ores in.

As that Meer cat character says - Easy!

  

 I've personally never been a fan of these 'inspection records' and scafftags and the likes.

Generally from what i see on site is "inspected on" and "next inspection due" dates which are usually weeks or in some cases a year apart.

Ladders, towers and other equipment should be checked by whoever is using it at the time, not by some monkey who is just employed to write on a bit of plastic that a ladder is ok.

 If you got pulled over by the police for having a bald tyre, you wouldn't get out of it by saying "well it's got an MOT so must be ok" would you?

Instead of bashing the messenger maybe we might look at the wigs who,especially those that are offering low cost claims service to people; who failed to exercise due diligence while at work. On the other side there are some very unscrupulous employers out there still who have no respect for life or limb, this has been shown by some of the recent court cases and the fines imposed, all that they wanted was the bottom line with no remorse on how it was achieved. Over here it is said that every employer is guilty under our Safety Health at Work Act,and by using the proper procedures you minimise the guilt to which you are exposed.. Remember everyone is out for a buck and all will avail of it, usually the faster the better.

 I know i'm gonna sound like an advert for Hovis and i fecking hate doing this!

But when i was a demo Top Man and we wanted to know if anything Aerial was safe (that my life depended on) all we had to do was ask the site scaffolders foreman and you could take that mans word to the bank!

I rest my case!