Manual handling: revised guidance

Citation

(1999), "Manual handling: revised guidance", Work Study, Vol. 48 No. 3. https://doi.org/10.1108/ws.1999.07948caf.001

Manual handling: revised guidance

Manual handling: revised guidance

The Health & Safety Executive (HSE) has published revised guidance to support the Manual Handling Operations Regulations 1992. The regulations impose duties on employers, self-employed people and employees. Employers must avoid all hazardous manual handling where it is reasonably practicable to do so. If it is not, they must assess the risks in relation to the nature of the task, the load, the working environment and the capabilities of the handler. Appropriate action must then be taken to reduce the risk to the lowest level reasonably practicable. Employees must follow appropriate work systems introduced by their employer to promote safety during the handling of loads.

Since employers generally found the original guidance to the regulations useful and readable, the revisions have concentrated on:

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  implementing the improvements identified in the Health & Safety Commission's review of the regulations, for example in the presentation of the numerical guidelines for risk assessment;

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  responding to concerns employers have expressed such as providing a worked example of the risk assessment checklist;

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  adding references to recent legislation including that relating to pregnant workers and people with disabilities.

The new guidance includes a revised Appendix 1 on the detailed assessment guidelines filter. This is designed to help employers make best use of limited resources by prioritising risk assessment effort and focus attention where it is needed most.

The guidelines will help employers and others, including safety representatives, identify trigger weights for lifting and lowering, pushing and pulling, and handling, and notes that seated operations require more detailed risk assessment.

The revised guidance includes expanded examples on:

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  duties in respect of self-employed people working under the direction of others (paragraph 8);

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  increased risk to pregnant workers and the benefits of a well-defined plan on how to respond when pregnancy is confirmed (paragraphs 102 to 103);

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  the Disability Discrimination Act and advice on the needs of people with disabilities (paragraph 104);

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  risk associated with lifting loads from floor level (paragraph 124);

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  the duties of manufacturers and suppliers (paragraphs 141 to 142);

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  how the risk may be affected if reducing the weight of the load means increasing the frequency of handling (paragraph 143);

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  the use of abdominal and back support belts (paragraphs 163 to 166).

Copies of Manual Handling: Guidance on Regulations are available for £8 from HSE books, tel: 01787 881165 or from booksellers.