Managing health and safety in construction

HSE publishes guidance on Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2015

THE Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has published guidance on the legal requirements of the Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2015 (CDM 2015), which came into force on 6 April 2015, replacing CDM 2007. ‘Managing health and safety in construction’, which can be downloaded for free from the HSE website, is available to help anyone with duties under the Regulations.

It describes:

• The law that applies to the whole construction process on all construction projects, from concept to completion
• What each duty holder must or should do to comply with the law to ensure projects are carried out in a way that secures health and safety.

CDM 2015 recognizes that there will be construction projects that started before the Regulations come into force on 6 April 2015 and will continue beyond that date. For these projects, the following transitional arrangements apply.

In situations where there is, or is expected to be, more than one contractor on a project:

• Where the construction phase has not yet started and the client has not yet appointed a CDM co-ordinator, the client must appoint a principal designer as soon as practicable
• If the CDM co-ordinator has already been appointed the client must appoint a principal designer to replace the CDM co-ordinator by 6 October 2015, unless the project comes to an end before then
• In the period it takes to appoint the principal designer, the appointed CDM co-ordinator should comply with the duties contained in Schedule 4 of CDM 2015. These reflect the duties placed on CDM co-ordinators under CDM 2007 rather than requiring CDM co-ordinators to act as principal designers, a role for which they may not be equipped.

Other transitional arrangements are:

• Pre-construction information, construction phase plans or health and safety files provided under CDM 2007 are recognized as meeting the equivalent requirements in CDM 2015
• Any project notified under CDM 2007 is recognized as a notification under CDM 2015
• A principal contractor appointed under CDM 2007 will be considered to be a principal contractor under CDM 2015.

In all other circumstances, the requirements of CDM 2015 apply in full effective from 6 April 2015.