Faculty of Natural Sciences - Life Sciences Health & Safety Committee

Wednesday 27th June 2007

Present:Dr Pietro Spanu (Chair)

Mr Stefan Hoyle (Faculty Safety)

Mrs Anna McDadd (Building Manager)

Mr Nathan Scott (Post Grad Rep)

Dr Anton de Paiva (IC Safety Dept. representative and Biosafety

Ms Linda Jones (Deputy F.O.O)

David Gentry (FSM Physics)

Julia Cotton (College Safety Auditor)

Ms Helga Koch – NHLI

Jake Bundy, Departmental Safety Coordinator for Bio molecular Medicine (SORA)

In attendance:Claudia Harriott (minutes)

MINUTES

1 Apologies for Absence

Apologies were received from:

Dr Robert Weinzierl (GM8a chair)

Professor Tony Magee (GM8b chair)

Jon Fear (IC Assistant RPO)

Gary Childs (CBS)

Norman Woolcock - SORA

The Chairman, Pietro Spanu opened the meeting by asking the people attending for the first time to introduce themselves.

Linda Jones informed the committee that she will be the Faculty representative until such time as the new Faculty Operating Officer is appointed.

Julia Cotton was in attendance to talk about the recent safety audit and to make comments on the new College Policies.

David Gentry (Faculty Safety Manager based in Physics) was in attendance to introduce himself to the committee.

2 Matters arising from Minutes of the meeting held on 18th April 2007

  • Project Safety Checklist - Stefan isworking on developing a document which should be in place by September. It was suggested to have a streamlined version, for new people, which should besent out before they start work at the college. One suggestion was that it could be sent out as part of thecontract of employment pack sent out by HR. There was a suggestion that the Occupational Health form could be extended to incorporate the safety checklist. The form should be signed by the individuals and returned to the Safety department. Stefan will be the point of contact for returning the form and for any questions relating to it. [Action: Stefan Hoyle]
  • Need to have in place by October an undergraduate representative for Biology and Biochemistry. A UG rep will be appointed [Action: Pietro Spanu)
  • Biological Safety - There was a general consensus that the Biological Safety Foundation course should be mandatory for those working in biological labs. To determine who attends this course, it was suggested that a training needs analysis should be carried out by line managers and reviewed annually.
  • GM Safety – Stefan Hoyle reported that he has received a list of CL2 – 3 activities and that everything is in order.

After review of all action points the minutes were approved and were signed off by Pietro.

3. Terms of Reference

The terms of reference were updated and sent out to the committee members and HoDs shortly after the first meeting. It now contains an additional appendix showing the working relationship between FoNS and the Divisions within Life Sciences.

4. Reports

a)Faculty Safety Manager

  1. PI Safety Survey - Stefan provided the Committee with a copy of a survey, and asked for comments before the form is sent out towards the end of July. The form is in acrobat reader and gives clear instructions on how it should be used.

One suggestion was that HR could add a paragraph reminding supervisors of their responsibility.

The form is designed for people already here and will be sent out by Heads of Division. Divisional Administrators will keep a checklist of who the form has been sent to and will chase responses.

Pietro asked that short deadline (of 1 week) should be given for responding and then chase if necessary.

  1. Project Safety Checklist (covered under item 2)
  1. Faculty arrangements - David Gentry and Stefan Hoyleare to write up a Faculty Health and Safety statement and arrangements document describing how the Faculty will comply with College policies. The document will be signed off by the Faculty Principal on behalf of the Faculty Management Committee. It will then be sent to HoDs, PIs and other staff as appropriate. [Action: Stefan and David]
  1. Local Rules - To assist with inductions and to provide information to staff and students local rules for the SAF and Biochemistry buildings are required. Stefan will liaise with Helga to produce a draft for the SAF building. Other FoM Divisions will be consulted during the process. [Action: Stefan and Helga]
  2. Safety Training - Stefan will be receiving monthly reports from the Safety Training Department on staff/students (from the Life Sciences Dept) who have attended safety training. The report will also include staff based at Silwood. This information could be sent to PIs and HoDs in future so they will be able to confirm training received by their staff. Stefan presented a sample of the report to the committee and asked for comments. Pietro suggested that historical data should be available on the list.
  1. Hazard Signage - It was noted that signs across buildings and even within the same building were not coordinated and quite a few were degenerated. Signs in SAF will be standardized. New plastic holders will be used – these will remain in situ permanently and paper inserted with the relevant sign/information. This will help prevent damage from occurring when the sign have are changed/removed.

Signs being put up will show who share lab etc and display emergency contact numbers. At present the information on a number of signs are out of date, giving contact details of people who no longer work here. Before any signs are changed Stefan Hoyle will speak to the relevant people about the proposal.

In Biochemistry building there are missing signs or signs that give conflicting information. Signs will be put in place to illustrate segregation of lab and office areas This is an ongoing project which, it is hoped, will be completed over the summer.

[Action: Stefan Hoyle]

b) Building issues and relocations

SAF

Plant Sciences relocation SAF &CS1

  1. Space on level 3 confirmed as is link bridge over to RCS1
  2. Space in basement confirmed once suitable alternative accommodation confirmed/identified
  3. Crooks Lab (North) - Strip out complete. Project completion now Dec 2007 with relocation due to take place early in 2008.

Funds from the Energy Savings budget have been identified to engineer a design to separate the NMR suite on Level 6 from the floors below. POs will be raised before the end of the financial year. This will not only bring about substantial energy savings but will create appropriate environments to disparate areas.

Biochemistry

Chilled water system – Commissioning still on going. Every single fan coil unit has been checked for adequate water flows. Level 7 has been reached. The parts of Chemistry serviced by the system are next to be checked. However system is now more stable - will require a final chemical dose on completion.

Drinking water -A main has been installed up through the building and pipe work has been run along the length of level 7 and requires final connection to kitchen facilities. Will need to run pipe work on levels 4, 5 & 6 before chlorination and commissioning.

Fallow Project - Awaiting progress report from Project Manager. Heat in basement remains a problem – fans will be installed.

Front facade. All panes secured. A final solution to rectify is ongoing. Cherry picker will be in this weekend to complete defects liability snagging on atrium facade.

CL3 Suite continuing to experiencing air supply/extract problems. Air handler frost coil/ heater battery is still clogging. Belts also may need changing. Issues with pressure differentials, not necessarily connected with air handler seem to indicate that verification of commissioning strategy may be required.

Emergency lighting levels 00 – 3 needs replacing as not compliant. POs have been raised to rectify. Building users are to be warned in advance of programme and any disruption.

Roof – Awaiting quote to improve roof likely penetration points. 3 major issues identified as probable cause of water ingress

Flowers

Sock change is still to take place. More urgent now to re –balance and re commission as energy consultants have advised that Flowers consumes more energy than even SAF, per 2m. Consultants have advised that changes to air handler time zones should be considered. Meeting is o be arranged with building users to discuss safety implications of shutting down or ramping back plant out of hours.

Please note no action will be taken before meeting.

RCS

New fume cupboard to be installed Monday 2nd July

Emeritus suite near completion

SALC project to commence

c) Student representative

A postgraduate survey (See appendix 1)has recently been conducted to determine levels of H&S awareness amongst postgraduate students within Life Sciences. A total of 38 responses were received from all the PGs in the Dept of Life Sciences. Stefan Hoyle to confirm that survey was sent to the PGs inDivision of Biology..

[Action: Stefan Hoyle]

Below is a summary of the results together with recommendations made.

Summary:

From the data obtained in this survey a third of respondents have not received a laboratory based H&S induction at the beginning of their studies.

Nearly a quarter of respondents who work in a biological laboratory have not been on the College Bio Safety Foundation training course.

Worryingly half of respondents do not know how to contact a first aider.

Eighty five percent of respondents work on their own after 7pm weekdays or anytime at weekends.

Only 55% of respondents are aware of COSHH and other assessments associated with their work.

A quarter of respondents do not know what to do in the event of a fire.

Positive results include a high percentage of respondents happy with their initial inductions (for those that had them) and ongoing health and safety supervision from within the lab (for those that get it). Only 4 respondents have had a near miss or accident and 3 of these reported it appropriately. Nearly 100% of respondents feel secure in their workplace

Recommendations:

Based on the results of this questionnaire, I would recommend that:

(1) A system is put in place such that all students get a “first day” induction from their lab/group and a subsequent induction on the safety course if they are lab based students.

(2) All students need to be made aware of COSHH – the course available is not enough – supervisors should be encouraged to ensure all their students have the relevant assessments.

(3) All first aid notices need replacing/updating and more people should be sent on first aid course so there are first aiders on each floor of each building.

(4) Perhaps an official out of hours log is required – maybe an online system

(5) More fire drills – in middle of day so as to capture more people – or perhaps fire safety needs to be included

Pietro suggested that the survey should be repeated to see how the result changes over time. He asked that the next survey is carried out at the same time next year and the result compared. [Action: Claudia/Stefan to note so it’s not overlooked]

Pietro asked Nathan to gather information from new recruits (first years) as to whether they have attended courses – the result from this survey is to be available by October. [Action: Nathan Scott]

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d)Biological Safety

  • Biosafety Training – the Foundation training courses for this academic year are now complete. Courses will re-commence in October. There will be one course per week in the College during the autumn term and one per month in subsequent terms.
  • Clinical Waste – a draft College Code of Practice on storage, handling and disposal of healthcare waste is nearing completion. This will be circulated to relevant parties for comment. A revised target of mid-July has been set for the draft version to be available for consultation. (There will be significant changes to the colour scheme for waste disposal bags).
  • Vapourised hydrogen peroxide – a programme for the replacement of formaldehyde as fumigant will be undertaken College-wide over the next 12-18 months. This will only take place following complete validation of the technology.

Actions Arising from External Safety Audit (HASTAM) – Progress Update

  • College Health & Safety Policy Statement and Health & Safety Organisation and Arrangements – these have now been finalised and will replace the existing versions shortly. Notification will be sent to all Principals, HoDs for distribution. The new versions will be uploaded onto the Safety Department web pages.
  • Training – the HASTAM Working Group are now turning their attention totraining gap analysis and the development of training matrices.

Use of College Vehicles

A guidance note concerning the operation of College vehicles (including minibuses) will be available on the College Finance website shortly. This note essentially covers insurance, driver licensing and vehicle checks. This ties in with the Safety Department guidance on Off Site Working and there will be a link from the relevant ‘transport’ page on the Offsite Working site.

Off Site Working

  • Completed examples of fieldwork risk assessments are currently being reviewed by the Off Site Working Group to gauge to what extent the templates are being utilised and to measure the quality of the assessments. A suitable ‘sample’ size is required and therefore Divisional Safety Officers FSMs are requested to remind those engaged in fieldwork to forward copies to the Safety Department: .
  • As part of the consultation process, a list of frequently asked questions (and answers) will be compiled and published.
  • An off site working Code of Conduct has been compiled and included as an appendix to the Policy document.

Noise Surveys

A campaign of noise surveys is now under way. These are being conducted by the Safety Department on a request basis at present. Anyone wishing to arrange a noise survey should contact Rohini Gowtham .

Documents for Consultation

As part of the function of SHRUG (Safety Health and Radiation Users Group) is to serve as a consultative forum, a SHRUG page has been set up on the Safety Department website: Documents currently under consultation will be made available on this page.

New Safety Department Web Pages

Recently added pages include:

  • Safety in Nanotechnology
  • Laser Safety
  • Manual Handling Policy (draft)

Mosquito bite was reported by an individual who thought the mosquito had escaped from the insectary on the 6th floor of SAF. The likelihood of that was thought to be very low. Prof Bob Sinden confirmed that the mosquito in question was in fact native to the UK. This is being looked at and Andrea Cresanti et al will be preparing a statement.

e)GM Safety

Both Tony Magee and Robert Weinzierl, in absentia, provided reports to be tabled at the meeting.

GM8a - A total of 5 new GM Risk Assessment Protocols were reviewed during the month of May – Two have been approved and 3 pending.

GM8b - During the period April – June there has been 2 form C submissions one of which has been approved and one pending.

f)Radiation Safety

Radiation Report from Jon Fear (College RPO)

1) New procedure (for Life Sciences RPSs) is in place for ordering radioactive substances – TAD numbers must be obtained by the RPS before the order for radioactivity is placed.

2) Waste. People should now be only using red burn bins. They are welcome to buy their own but can get from me at cost. At last I have had a stock delivered (have been waiting 2 months!). If they are only generating small amounts of waste in bench top containers then they can continue and I will take these away and bulk up in red bins if it is more convenient for them?

3) The irradiator key must now be returned to the main security reception in Sherfield if SAF reception is not manned. The guidelines and procedures have been updated and circulated to reflect this (due irradiator incident, please see section 6 for further details).

4) JF and SH are currently reviewing the 'waste' store in the basement of SAF and will report at the next meeting on the outcome of this.

David gentry said red bins for waste disposal are in short supply.

g)Occupational Health (Melanie Phillips sent in report to be tabled at the meeting)

1. Health Surveillance

The May surveillancehas commencedand will be conducted in the usual format.

The November 2006 surveillance identified 2 new cases - one at Hammersmith and one at South Kensington

Staff and students previously diagnosed with LAA were reviewed. All still undertaking this work reported adequate symptom control.

2. Manual Handling Policy

The College Manual Handling Policy has been revised and has been to the H&S Consultative Committee for comment andwas presented at SHRUG.Subsequent M & H Training will be modified.

3. Risk Assessment for New and Expectant Mothers

New guidance on the above was presented at SHRUG andis tobe found on the OH web pages.