Health and Safety
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Rating: +0
How do I do Risk Assessments?
Risk Assessments are required for productions in the Oxford Playhouse and all garden shows and balls. As time goes on, I believe they will become a requirement for all theatrical projects.
Urban Sciences, HTS and Die Hard Productions all prepare risk assessments for events, and in fact it is almost certainly a legal requirement (not just a general college requirement). Preparing the documents takes time and therefore costs these companies. I would therefore be surprised if any are willing to pass on such assessments (unless they are involved in the
project) although there can be no harm in trying! There may be copyright issues involved with 'borrowing' assessments from other events without the writers permission.The government have a couple of guides to writing risk assessments eg http://www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/raindex.htm otherwise try talking to the local council H&S people - people such as Tony Judd (for fire safety) or Alex Solaja (environmental health) both of whom you should already be in contact with. I am sure they have leaflets and advice on such matters.
It is worth anyone who is writing such assessments to bear in mind that trying to cut costs by putting together a 'cheap' risk assessment could seriously backfire. If something does go wrong and the assessment is found to be inadequate, the consequences are extremely serious.
Alex Prideaux, April 2005
Further to Alex's comments....
Firstly ask for help - the HSE are very helpful as are the council; there
is the colleges fire officer (or the university fire officer if you college is classed as a university dept (eg Green) or you are doing it on university not college land) and there are two people from environmental health, Alex Solaja and another person from the food and safety dept who's name I forgot but who was very helpful.Also when doing risk assesments for such events remember that the college wont just want a risk assesment for the technical side - there are many dangers at a ball or garden show which need addressing I've listed some below:
Broken Glass
Steps
Fire risks (and how you are minimising them) Cables / Pipes Equipment at height Earthing / electricution Manual Lifting (inlcuding tech and alcohol!)A risk assesment for such an event must cover the staff & patrons so think about what you are having staff doing. A risk assesment should also cover the set up and clear up for an event.
I usually do my risk assesments based on the ones I do in the lab and they have the following columns:
Description of Risk Severity Factor Likelyhood Risk (severity x
likelyhood) Measurers that can be used to control the risk New severity
New likelyhood Remaining Risk Action to be taken if thing happens.....Ideally the remaining risk will be low. If it isn't then you need to rethink how you deal with that risk as you should always ensure that the risk is low. That last column is more applicable to COSHH (chemical) risk assesments but i think is important as you then you know what treatment is best.
Mark Roberts, April 2005
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