Health, Safety & Welfare on a Construction Site

Construction sites are often very dangerous places. Construction workers and management must work to ensure that the health, safety and welfare of everyone involved is not in jeopardy.

Features

• All of the safety activities that take place on a construction site should be aimed to prevent accidents and bad health. Construction managers should work to prevent even those accidents that do not lead to injury.

Safety Management

• Safety management has three main objectives when it comes to construction sites, according to the International Labor Organization. The environment should be safe, the job has to be safe, and the workers must be safety conscious.

Safety Plan

• Construction managers must come up with a safety plan that is known and respected by all the workers on the site. A good safety plan assigns specific tasks to specific people, and also is known by all workers no matter how insignificant their role is.

Foreman

• The foreman, or supervisor, of a construction project plays an essential role in the health, safety and welfare of a construction site. A foreman must ensure that working conditions are safe, safety is regularly inspected, workers are adequately trained in safety, and that the necessary protective equipment is provided.

Workers

• Workers should participate in what is known as a "tool-box briefing," which is a 10 to 15 minute meeting in which the foreman goes over the safety plan and makes sure that the workers play an active role in ensuring safety.