Health and Safety

Plans for a gigafactory close to a former RAF airfield in the West Midlands have been dealt a blow after the site was deemed at high risk of containing unexploded Second World War bombs. Ground investigations carried out at the site of the new 530,000 square metre gigafactory at Coventry…

Developers caught dragging their heels on remediation work to fix dangerous cladding will face planning permission blocks under newly tabled rules. Housebuilders slow to remove unsafe cladding and other materials will be barred from obtaining planning permission and building on their existing planning permission, under regulations introduced by the government.…

A rail maintenance operative suffered “life changing” injuries when a stationary mobile elevating work platform (MEWP) was hit by a crane in the second such incident involving the same subcontractors, the Rail Accident Investigation Branch (RAIB) has found. According to a report released by the RAIB yesterday, Network Rail had…

Insurers and the government have developed a new insurance approach that could speed up removals of unsafe cladding, such as that involved in the Grenfell Tower disaster. The International Underwriting Association (IUA) said it hoped to resolve what had been a “difficult” market for firms seeking cover. It worked with…

One person has died and three people have been injured in an incident at a concrete company in Devon that has prompted a Health and Safety Executive (HSE) investigation. Devon and Cornwall Police were called by the ambulance service to reports of an industrial incident at West Country Concrete Products…

The Building Engineering Services Association (BESA) has issued an urgent warning to all contractors over the safety of fire dampers. Inspections by maintenance contractors found that a “huge number of dampers” had been incorrectly installed and would fail to work during a building fire. BESA’s head of technical Graeme Fox…

A worker at Hinkley Point C has been seriously injured after his leg was struck by a falling panel. The incident took place on Saturday. According to a colleague speaking to the Somerset County Gazette, a wall "came away and landed on top" of the man. "A steel frame box…

Pre-tax profits at Costain rose by more than a fifth in the first half of this year, thanks to inflation protection mechanisms written into its contracts. In interim results for the half-year ended 30 June, published this morning, the contractor reported pre-tax profits of £11.2m, compared with £9.1m during the…

Plans for a new £300m, state-of-the-art cancer hospital in Cambridge have moved one step closer, after being given permission to find a contractor. The Cambridge Cancer Research Hospital (CCRH) project, which is part of the government’s larger New Hospital Programme (NHP), aiming to deliver 48 hospital schemes by 2030, has…

A site worker on a Galliford Try project near Brighton was knocked unconscious after a colleague dropped a bottle filled with urine from a 50m crane. Police were called to investigate after the bottle, launched by the crane operator, struck an unnamed co-worker at the site of a new health…