Latest health and safety news
Here you can find the latest health and safety news.
6 November 2024 - Important news for all schools
Health and Safety Assurance Audits
Schools that haven't had a full Health and Safety Audit carried out in more than two years are required to have one carried out in this academic year.
For schools who have signed up to the Enhanced SLA, please contact the Corporate H&S Team to arrange your audit as soon as possible.
Team diaries fill very quickly, therefore, even if your audit isn’t due until early next year, by booking early, it will ensure you won’t be disappointed if other commitments nearer the time mean the team are unable to accommodate your requested date.
Getting the most from your other benefits of the Enhanced SLA
It is highly important for all schools to ensure that all Health and Safety related guidelines and legislation is being followed and checked periodically.
The Corporate H&S Team are ready to provide support and guidance as needed, many of which are included in the Basic or Enhanced SLA:
- Access to HSMS, Sypol, HelpDesk, Radiation Officer (secondary Schools only)
- Meet the Headteacher and Governors
- Support with Enforcing Authorities
- Training Courses
- Legionella reviews
- Risk Assessments reviews etc.
Schools Service Level Agreement (SLA)
Schools will shortly be contacted by the Schools SLA Team to sign up to next year’s SLA (2025-26).
The SLA offers significant benefits towards providing your school with the assurance it’s H&S is being managed efficiently and effectively and in-line with legislation, and we encourage all schools to sign up for the New 2025-2026 Service Level Agreement as soon as it is available to do so.
An SLA Event is to be held on 28 January, which all schools will be invited to attend. This will provide information on all the SLA’s that SCC offer to schools and an opportunity to sign up. Please attend if you can.
If you have any queries regarding the SLA please contact health.and.safety@southampton.gov.uk.
Ad-Hoc Services are also available to purchase on demand for those who don't wish to sign up to the full SLA. Please contact our team for information.
New guidance
The Corporate Health and Safety Service is working on creating new guidance relating to Lithium Batteries. This will replace the previous SWP for Lithium Batteries. It includes information on how to use, store, maintain and dispose of lithium batteries safely. Please look out for this new guidance on the Schools Guidance pages.
Incident reporting
The Corporate H&S Team strive to ensure all incidents reported via the online H&S reporting system (HSMS) are reviewed and closed as quickly as possible. This is to ensure serious incidents receive the attention and support required and to ensure compliance with RIDDOR regulations.
However, this task is made more difficult if schools do not complete the Manager Review section of incidents in a timely manner.
Please help us to help you by ensuring we have the correct email address for those who are responsible for reviewing and updating Manager’s Reviews for your school, making sure you email the team if there are any changes so that we can update our systems.
Please note, the HSE has updated the RIDDOR reporting form for all incident/accidents. Therefore, please ensure all serious incidents that will need to be reported on HSE under RIDDOR, contain clear information regarding the following:
- What was the work activity being undertaken at the time of the accident?
- What happened in the lead up to the accident?
- What were the environmental conditions at the time of the accident e.g. weather, temperature, lighting, floor/ground condition?
- What was the name and type of the machinery/equipment/substances involved in the accident?
- What action have you taken to prevent similar accidents occurring?
- Describe the nature of the injuries sustained
- Is there any other relevant information which describes what happened?
Important Note: All of the above mentioned are new questions implemented in the RIDDOR Reporting form. Please ensure that all this information is clearly stated in the HSMS reporting form in the Managers' Review section (comments box).
Failure to receive this information may mean the CHSS will not be able to submit a RIDDOR report within the timeframe required under RIDDOR Regulations.
Staff personal medicines in schools
A recent incident has highlighted the importance of staff in schools, who may need to have personal medications with them, to ensure these are not bought into teaching areas, even in personal handbags or other bags.
Please ensure all staff members are aware that personal medicines must be kept in areas, which are not accessible by pupils, at all times.
Upcoming training courses
Please see below a list of training that the Corporate H&S team are providing over coming months:
- 8 January 2025 – Asbestos Awareness
- 22 January 2025 – Caretaker/Site Manager – General H&S (am)
- 22 January 2025 – Caretaker/Site Manager – Fire Safety (pm)
- 23 January 2025 – Caretaker/Site Manager – Legionella Awareness (am)
- 23 January 2025 – Caretaker/Site Manager – Asbestos Awareness (pm)
- 4 March 2025 – Accident & Incident Reporting and Investigation
- 13 March 2025 – Display Screen Equipment (DSE) Assessor
- 27 March 2025 – Accident & Incident Reporting and Investigation
- 2 April 2025 – Fire Marshal Training
To book any of the above training, please contact Learning and Development.
Important: Please note, a charge applies for schools to attend these training sessions, please see details below:
- The cost of training for schools who are NOT signed up to the Schools H&S SLA or who are only signed up to or entitled to the Basic SLA is charged at £109.20 per delegate.
- For schools who are signed up to the Enhanced Schools H&S SLA, there is one free place at a half day course per year included (course must be run by a member of the Corporate H&S Team). After this free place has been used, all other training is charged at a discounted rate of a £10 reduction in price for the first person (i.e. £99.20) and £20 reduction for all other delegates attending the same H&S training course on the same day from the same school (i.e. £89.20).
- Caretaker/Site Manager sessions are charged at £65 per person per session, or £220 in total for the same person to attend all four sessions. Schools who are signed up to the Enhanced SLA will be charged a discounted rate of £55 per person per session. Schools who use their free half day training place for one session, will be charged at the discounted rate of £55 per person per session for all other sessions attended (£165 for the remaining three sessions)
- Non-attendance on the day for all training will be charged at the rates quoted above.
HSE Stress Awareness Week: 4 to 8 November 2024
Raise awareness of legal duty
Many people still don’t realise that it’s a legal duty to include work-related stress in risk assessments. You can help change that during stress awareness week by supporting HSE’s Working Minds campaign.
The campaign helps raise awareness that all employers are required by law to prevent work-related stress and support good mental health by doing a risk assessment and acting on it.
You could:
- Talk about it at your next one-to-one with a staff member
- Bring it up at a team meeting
- Encourage others to do our free bitesize online learning
- Download and share resources, such as our one-page summary of support, a campaign poster and social media graphics, with your colleagues and networks
The Enhanced SLA provides access to the HSE’s online Stress Risk Assessment Tool, please contact the Corporate H&S Team for further information if you would like to consider running a Stress Risk Survey in your school.
Fire alarm testing in school
Please be aware that when Housing Operations carry out Fire Alarm Testing they check and report if smoke devices are out of date as per manufactures recommendations and schools need to ensure these are replaced accordingly.
Water quality management - Legionella
Schools are reminded that they must ensure they have sufficient competency to review their legionella risk assessments in order to prioritize and complete actions accordingly. Actions taken must be recorded and records made available for inspection on request.
Legionella Awareness training is available on 23 January at a cost of £65 per delegate or £55 if attending all four Caretaker/Site Manager Modules. Please contact Learning and Development to book a place.
Lifting Operations and Lifting Equipment Regulations (LOLER)
The Lifting Operations and Lifting Equipment Regulations 1998 are extremely wide-reaching and, consequently, it’s easy to get caught out if you aren’t aware of how they could apply to your workplace.
In educational settings, LOLER inspections are required for various types of lifting equipment, such as passenger lifts, wheelchair lifts, platform lifts, laboratory equipment hoists, and any other equipment used for lifting purposes, to ensure they meet safety standards.
Make sure you are compliant in your school.
Rising violence and abuse incidents
It is noted that there is a growing increase of violence and abuse incidents in schools, especially against staff members.
Some of this may be down to better reporting, which is a positive.
However, where this isn’t the case, whilst it is appreciated such incidents are sometimes attributable to the challenging behaviours of some of the children we support, especially those who may have special educational needs, schools are encouraged to review such incidents carefully to see if there is any means to reduce the risks of injuries to their staff as far as reasonably practicable.
Older news
View previous health and safety news updates.
4 July 2024 - Caretaker and site managers annual training sessions announcement
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Caretaker/site manager health and safety training – November 2024
The Corporate Health and Safety Service team are pleased to announce that they will be running caretaker/site manager training for schools again this year in November, with session as shown below:
- 12 November (am) session will be general health and safety awareness
- 12 November (pm) session will be fire safety awareness
- 13 November (am) session will be legionella awareness
- 13 November (pm) session will be asbestos awareness
The cost of attending this will be £65 per person, per session.
If all four sessions are attended by the same person, a discounted rate of £220 will apply.
Schools who are signed up to the Enhanced Service Level Agreement, can use their free half day training place for one session, with the remaining sessions at a discounted rate of £55 each.
Please email health.and.safety@southampton.gov.uk if you would like to book a place.
18 June 2024 - Important news for all schools
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It is not too late to sign up for the Health and Safety Service Level Agreement (SLA)!
We encourage all Southampton City Council schools to sign up for the new 2024-2025 Service Level Agreement.
Ad-Hoc Services are available to purchase on demand for those who don't wish to sign up. Please contact our team for information.
The Corporate Health and Safety team would like to encourage all schools to start using their SLA package services.
Please contact our team to organise your yearly health and safety audit at your earliest convenience. All schools that have not had their health and safety audit in more that two years are required to have one carried out in this academic year.
It is highly important for all schools to ensure that all health and safety related guidelines and legislation are being followed and checked periodically.
Our team is fairly flexible and are here to help you with any health and safety issues you might encounter.
All other services offered in your SLA packages (Basic or Enhanced) are available for you to use such as:
- Access to HSMS; Sypol, HelpDesk; Radiation Officer ( secondary Schools only)
- Meet the Headteacher and Governors
- Support with Enforcing Authorities
- Training Courses
- Legionella reviews
- Risk Assessments reviews
And so on.
New guidance in process
The Corporate Health and Safety Service team is working presently on creating a new safe working procedure regarding guidance of use and disposal of lithium batteries. Please watch out for our future bulletins.
Health and Safety Executive news - RIDDOR reportable incidents in schools
The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has updated the Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations (RIDDOR) reporting form for all incident/accidents. Therefore, please ensure all serious incidents that will need to be reported on HSE website contain clear information regarding the following:
- What was the work activity being undertaken at the time of the accident?
- What happened in the lead up to the accident?
- What were the environmental conditions at the time of the accident, for example, weather, temperature, lighting, floor/ground condition?
- What was the name and type of the machinery/equipment/substances involved in the accident?
- What action have you taken to prevent similar accidents occurring?
- Describe the nature of the injuries sustained
- Is there any other relevant information which describes what happened?
Important note: All of the above mentioned are new questions implemented in the RIDDOR Reporting form. Please ensure that all this information is clearly stated in the Health and Safety Management System (HSMS) reporting form in the managers' review section (comments box). Failure to receive this information means that the Corporate Health and Safety Service will not be able to submit a RIDDOR report in a timely manner.
New training courses announcement
The Corporate Health and Safety team are reviewing the training we offer and would like to invite schools to consider if there is any specific training which they feel may be suitable for face-to-face training. Some ideas we have considered already are:
- Working at Height – steps and ladders – suitable for site managers/caretakers?
- Slips, trips and falls – general staff training?
- Care of substances hazardous to health (COSHH) and Sypol – suitable for cleaners and site managers?
- Manual handling – suitable for site managers/caretakers?
If you have any training, which you feel might be appropriate for your school and which other schools may be interested in, please email health.and.safety@southampton.gov.uk.
Important: If your school is interested in hosting any of the training courses and have a suitable room available with internet connection and a screen to connect to with a laptop, please contact us to organise this event. Ideally there should be toilets close by and provision of tea and coffee. In return, Corporate Health and Safety will offer one or two free training course places depending on the number of delegates the room can comfortably hold.
3 May 2024 - Southampton City Council will be tendering for a new water quality contract
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Southampton City Council is tendering for a long term water quality contract (including legionella risk assessment) and set out below are the main objectives of the council’s strategic objectives for this contract:
- To reorganise the water quality compliance services and implement a sustainable, best practice, customer focussed and collaborative approach to the management of water quality compliance and standards
- To procure and maintain a comprehensive record of Mechanical and Electrical (M&E) asset lifecycle condition
- To successfully digitise all water quality compliance data and M&E asset management data
- To implement and sustain the use of a online Logbook at each site by Responsible Building Occupiers
In line with strategic objectives (three and four) for the new water quality contract, the council intends to introduce an online logbook. This will be for recording water quality monitoring and the management of risk assessment data, such as uploading legionella risk assessments, water system schematic drawings and sampling results, and recording remedial actions and hot and cold water infrastructure planned preventative maintenance.
The online logbooks are located on the Technology Forge (TechForge) asset management cloud database and the use of the online logbook across the sites shall ‘go-live’ at the commencement of the new contract.
All sites having duties under the Control of Substances Hazardous to Health (COSHH) regulations which includes managing of legionella, will therefore need to migrate to using the online logbook as a matter of routine. This is in much the same way and for same purpose as sites are currently doing for the recording of control measures such as flushing of outlets in the existing logbooks.
The council has issued all sites with the TechForge log-in details and the sites will need to ensure that they are able to access the database. Please note however, thecCouncil is not in a position to provide access to laptops or mobile devices and these matters, if they are pertinent, must be resolved between the responsible persons on the site.
Arrangements shall be made prior to the commencement of the new contract to host a workshop for the sites. The council shall provide further updates in due course.
Hampshire & Isle of Wight Emollients Campaign
Please find the latest HIWFRS News - March 2024 and in particular the item covering the Emollients Campaign. There are a number of schools that have pupils who use emollients as part of their daily care and it is very important for all to read this news bulletin.
29 April 2024 - Health and safety fire risk assessment reviewer training course 24 May 2024
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The Corporate Health and Safety Service (CHSS) provide Health and Safety Fire Risk Assessment Reviewer training, which is a half day course.
All schools who subscribe to the Enhanced Health and Safety Service Level Agreement (SLA) 2024/25 are entitled to a free training place. If you have already used this, you are entitled to a discounted rate of a £10 reduction in price for the first person (£99.20) and £20 reduction for all other delegates attending the same health and safety training course on the same day from the same school (£89.20).
For schools who have not subscribed to the Enhanced SLA, the cost is £109.20 per person.
Currently, this training is scheduled to run at the Civic Centre in Committee Rooms One and Two, starting at 9.30am on Friday 24 of May 2024.
If you have anyone who would like to attend this training, please contact Learning and Development to book a place. Please note, this training is scheduled for up to three hours and no refreshments are available, therefore please ensure all delegates bring a drink with them and a snack if necessary.
For any other health and safety training courses, please refer to the Learning and Development Intranet pages.
18 March 2024 - The Corporate Health and Safety Service Level Agreement notification
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Service Level Agreement
It is not too late to sign up for the Health and Safety Service Level Agreement (SLA)!
We encourage all Southampton City Council schools to sign up for the New 2024-2025 SLA.
Ad-hoc services are available to purchase on demand for those who do not wish to sign up. Please contact our team for information.
The new Schools Health and Safety SLA packages for the academic year 2024/25 have been released.
Please note there is still time to sign up to this year’s Schools Health and Safety SLA.
Schools can sign up to the Schools Health and Safety SLA at any time of the year, however the SLA runs from 1 April to 31 March annually and therefore the earlier you sign up the more value you get!
The benefits of signing up are considerable and are offered as a basic service and an enhanced service:
The basic service provides access to the council’s online Incident Reporting system (HSMS), which allows the Corporate Health and Safety Service (CHSS) to track your accidents and incidents and, where necessary, offer appropriate support. It also provides guidance and support in relation to enforcing authorities, such as the Health and Safety Executive (HSE), especially in relation to Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations (RIDDOR) reporting and/or any interventions
The Enhanced SLA provides an opportunity for you and/or your governors to meet with someone from the CHSS to raise any queries relating to health and safety, and best practice. It also provides the opportunity for the school to receive a full audit each year to assist you with monitoring the effectiveness of your health and safety management systems and to provide you with assistance towards improving where necessary.
Both Health and Safety SLA packages provide a host of other benefits, including guidance and support from an experienced team of health and safety professionals towards assisting you in ensuring you are discharging your statutory and other health and safety responsibilities adequately.
For further information on the full benefits of both the basic and enhanced services, please view the SLA guidance. Please note, the new SLA also includes information regarding the Emergency Planning SLA, which may also be of interest to you.
If you have any questions or queries relating to the Health and Safety SLA, please do not hesitate to contact the CHSS for further information.
To sign up to any of the SLA’s, please email SLAs@southampton.gov.uk.
23 February 2024 - Important news regarding the new Southampton City Council asbestos data base
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Southampton City Council are now ready to go live with a new asbestos register called Keystone Mini. You can access ‘Mini’ now. This will replace the existing asbestos register and will serve both the council and all external parties that require access to the our asbestos register.
Keystone Mini will go live on Monday 26 February.
To find out how to use Keystone Mini please see the Keystone Mini Guidance document.
To request log in credentials please email Asbestos.RegulatoryService@southampton.gov.uk and include the email addresses of those that will require access.
Prior to any works that intrude and/or disturb the fabric of a building that was constructed before 2000, it is mandatory that you check the asbestos register to confirm that the area of proposed work has been adequately assessed for asbestos. If there is no evidence of prior asbestos checks that are specifically targeted to the work, you must request a survey. Requests for surveys must be logged via your Southampton City Council Project Manager or please email the Asbestos Team as above.
The Asbestos Team will be on hand to provide support and guidance with any asbestos information. If you would like to contact the team, please email Asbestos.RegulatoryService@southampton.gov.uk. The Asbestos Team will always respond as promptly as possible but if your request is urgent, please call 023 8083 2170.
Please note that following the switchover to Keystone Mini, the existing asbestos database system will be switched off.
For more information, return to the main health and safety page.
