Now I’m going to touch upon health and safety. This relatively new phenomenon has provided approximately 40,000 new jobs across the UK. Whether these people do actually believe that you are at risk from climbing onto a 9 inch footstall or whether they are just doing it for the money I suppose we will never know.
At work, we have a ‘health and safety’ file. We have a health and safety poster, which must bear the signature of everyone who steps into the dangers of ‘the backroom’. We have health and safety meetings, health and safety briefings, monthly health and safety leaflets (this is when they have discovered something new and dangerous every month which was not previously recorded in the 7 inch thick health and safety file). We even a have health and safety inspector, and lastly we have an ‘incident and accident and every time someone coughs’ book, which due to latest reviews must include daily written accounts of ‘potential dangers’ as well as actual incidents.
Here is where I admit my downfalls as a manager. After the 36th day of arriving at work to write about the ‘danger of the step’ before I did anything else, I’m afraid the book was slung to one side as never used again. That is until Gloria joined all of our other customers and promptly fell down the step and broke her wrist. I think this got a mention.
The step. This, to our shop, is like a man-trap placed right across the centre of the room. It catches at least one person a day. And to think our ancestors had to invent such things as gin-traps.
Our customers fall up, or down it constantly. We have a large ‘please mind the step’ sign, yellow and black tape, flashing hazard warning lights and crash barriers guiding people to the danger. We even put up a fold away ramp, but people would fly off the side of this one backwards, usually landing on across the counter, and this proved much more hazardous than the original straight up or down ‘step’ fall.
One woman even tried to pursue legal action against us, a charity which helps people with debilitating disabilities.
After completing an incident booklet especially for the step, I managed to persuade the inspector at our recent health and safety visit to provide funding for a permanent slope. After announcing the good news to one of our struggling customers, I was greeted with an earful on how slopes are ok for ‘you young and fit’ but have I ever ‘put your back out launching yourself onto a slope that you didn’t know was there’. I can’t win.
Geogger 