FEATURE ASBESTOS YOU CAN With recent changes to the asbestos removal system still bedding in, why is
the maximum three-year licence impor tant, and how do firms increase their chances of receiving one, asks Nick Garland of Assure360.
WHY DOES ASBESTOS REMOVAL NEED A
LICENCE? Asbestos was once used extensively worldwide for its insulating and fire-resistant properties, but it’s highly carcinogenic. In the UK it was banned in 1999, but around 5,000 people still die each year from asbestos- related disease.
Such is the hazard that the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) operates a ‘permissioning regime’, licencing contractors who undertake higher-risk asbestos work. Becoming a licensed asbestos removal contractor (LARC) is not easy. The HSE’s assessment is rigorous, demanding that contractors demonstrate, “the necessary skills, competency, expertise, knowledge and experience of work with asbestos, together with excellent health and safety management systems”.
For an asbestos contractor, obtaining and renewing a licence is costly and time-consuming, so the ideal is to continuously demonstrate a great degree of competence, increasing the chance of the maximum three-year licence. However, only a third of LARCs have this kind. In the last statistics widely shared by the HSE (June 2018), the breakdown was:
• 49% three-year licence • 29% two-year licence • 22% < two-year licence
WHAT ARE THE RECENT CHANGES? LARCs must produce method statements and documentation far more detailed and considered than their construction counterparts. They spend vast sums on training and must supervise work to a much greater degree than other industries. Exposure monitoring is done by skilled analysts, in line with guidance.
Proper record keeping, analysis and process management have always been important to licence renewal, but from December 2018, the HSE made a major change to licence evaluations. The new regime places the onus on contractors to support their application with more detailed information and
evidence. Depending on the quality of this evidence, and the HSE’s experience with the applicant from previous site inspections, there are three possible outcomes: outright refusal, a targeted assessment meeting, or the grant of a licence.
HOW DO LARCS DEMONSTRATE
COMPETENCE? It’s meant to be a challenging system. Asbestos is the most regulated industry after nuclear, and as a permissioning regime, only the best companies should be approved. The HSE is looking for continued competence, but when it asks, “How do you manage health and safety?”, “Show us what you do to measure competence”, or “How many personal air tests have you done this year?”, all too often LARCs answer with a jumble of files, spreadsheets or - in the worst case - un-actioned paper audits.
These homebrewed solutions are hard to maintain, audit and analyse, and they’re labour-intensive. A LARC may be highly competent, but to enhance and demonstrate that, it needs an efficient record- keeping system.
Assure360 Audit is designed to streamline and demonstrate the key tasks of health and safety management, competence, and action planning. With the time this saves the contractor, it can focus on better project management, raising the chances that jobs will be completed safely and on-programme.
Comparing our own data with that of the HSE, we see that our clients markedly outperform the industry when it comes to longer licence terms. In our most recent data, 71% of Assure360 Audit users held a three- year licence - almost 50% more than the industry-wide rate (49%).
A great deal of expertise, hard work and dedication is needed to perform to these high standards, but we feel there’s a relationship between the high proportion of three-year licences amongst our clients, and their ability to demonstrate competence and effective H&S management.
www.assure360.co.uk
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