A selection of this week's silliest health and safety stories
August is here and, with Parliament on recess until the 5th of September, silly season is in full swing here in Britain. This is that time of year when news outlets, starved of real stories, publish all sorts of daft articles in the hope of keeping readers interested until the end of the summer holidays.
As we've seen in previous years, cringeworthy health and safety stories tend to become a lot more commonplace during silly season - it seems that nothing gets readers fired up like an opportunity to complain about "health and safety gone mad". To give you a taste of the absurdity that besmirches health and safety's good name every August, here are 3 of the silliest H&S stories from the past 7 days:
- Flower Baskets Taken Down: Lincolnshire newspaper the Spalding Guardian reported yesterday that the Holbeach in Bloom committee were up in arms after being told to take down several hanging flower baskets. The baskets had been hanging from brackets on Western Power electricity poles. "I just think it's health and safety gone mad," said Graham Rudkin, chairman of Holbeach in Bloom. "We check the brackets every year and the baskets are not a danger to anybody." A spokesman for Western Power stated that the baskets had been ordered removed because the company could not allow anything to interfere with or be connected to its electrical infrastructure in any way. [source]
- Shop Sign Sparks Debate: Last Friday, Gloucestershire Live shared the story of a Winchcombe toy store who had placed an advertising board in the street outside the shop in the hope of attracting extra customers. Toys to Grow sought permission from Highways England before setting out the sign, but this didn't stop another local business from registering a formal complaint on the grounds that the board represented a potential trip hazard. Gloucestshire Today published this story under the headline 'Health and safety gone mad? 'Trip hazard' shop sign sees Winchcombe divided'. Local residents have reportedly rallied around the toy shop, with many donating money to help the business obtain planning permission for a wall sign instead. [source]
- Trampoline Tiff: Residents of West View Lane in Sheffield were disappointed last weekend when a housing provider threatened to take away a children's trampoline that several local families had chipped in to purchase. "We understand some residents will be disappointed we can't allow a trampoline in a communal garden," said a spokesperson for The Guinness Partnership, "but their health and wellbeing is our main priority." One resident, Allison Allette, stated: "We, as parents, feel the trampoline is safe and that should be all that matters." She also described the whole situation as - you guessed it - "health and safety gone mad". [source]
As we've suggested before, the trouble with stories like these is that they reinforce the public perception of health and safety as something that's simply out to spoil their enjoyment. As most of us know, this simply isn't the case - health and safety is there to save lives, and the sooner people stop attacking it and using it as an excuse for other things, the sooner everyone will come to view it in a more positive light.
Follow Label Source on Twitter for more health and safety insight.
