Introduction to health safety at work

Introduction to Health and Safety at Work has quickly established itself, in its fi rst four years, as the foremost text for students taking the NEBOSH National General Certifi cate. It is also of great value to those studying for level 3 N/SVQ, the IOSH Managing Safely Award and similar management and supervisor focused learning. It has become a signifi cant work of reference for managers with health and safety responsibilities and it is therefore a matter of primary importance that it should be kept up-to-date, as far as is possible, with new legislation and recent developments. This third edition has been produced in order to update the health and safety legislation, with particular regard to changes in legislation relating to fi re, construction (CDM), asbestos, vibration, noise, hazardous waste and the environment. The most signifi cant change since the second edition has been the introduction of the unitized NEBOSH National General Certifi cate. The course has been divided into three distinct units each of which is assessed separately. This development offers the opportunity for additional and more fl exible course formats and students may now study parallel courses (in, say, fi re and construction) without repeating the management unit. Students who decide to take individual units will, on passing, receive a Unit Certifi cate. There were also some minor changes to the syllabus – safety in the use of lifting and moving equipment, construction health hazards, further controls of substances that can cause cancer, asthma or damage to genes and the safe storage of incompatible wastes. Following advice from several reviewers, we have taken the opportunity to introduce a new chapter on NEBOSH assessment – Specimen answers to NEBOSH examinations (Chapter 20). This includes two long answer questions, four short answer questions and a specimen practical application (or assessment). Some more recent examination questions have been added. Since the fi rst edition of this book was published, there has been a change in the style of examination questions and some topics, such as swimming pools and kitchens, are not specifi cally mentioned in the syllabus. Many questions now cover the contents of more than one chapter. It is recommended that students have sight of the published examiners’ reports which are available from NEBOSH. These reports not only provide an excellent guide on the expected answers to the questions but also indicate areas of student misunderstanding. Since 1 September 2004 there have been changes in the National Qualifi cations Framework (NQF) that are relevant to the NEBOSH General Certifi cate. However, up to Level 3 the NQF is unchanged and therefore its effect on the certifi cate will be minimal. The certifi cate syllabus is designed to provide the underpinning knowledge for the ‘Health and Safety for People at Work’ standard, an approved level 3 vocational standard developed by the Employment National Training Organization (ENTO). The syllabus is unitized to make it as compatible as possible with short courses based on the eight units of the ENTO standard. The NEBOSH National General Certifi cate is accredited as a level 3 award by the Qualifi cations and Curriculum Authority (QCA). More detailed information on these eight units is available in the guide to the NEBOSH National General Certifi cate. The third edition, which continues to closely follow the eight units, will therefore be particularly useful to people involved with the ‘Health and Safety for People at Work’ level 3 ENTO standard. As mentioned earlier, the certifi cate syllabus has been updated to include much of the new legislation. However, it is the policy of NEBOSH to examine new relevant legislation six months after its introduction whether it is specifi cally mentioned in the syllabus document or not. Finally, one of the objectives of the book is to provide a handbook for the use of any person who has health and safety as part of their responsibilities. We thought that it would be helpful, therefore, to keep the few useful topics