Optimising the Elements of a Construction Health and Safety (H&S) Programme and Audit System

Abstract

The Master Builders South Africa (MBSA) are reviewing the elements of their national H&S Audit System, and the author was approached to assist with respect to the review in terms of research to identify where the focus of such an H&S Audit System should be. Although audits focus on the physical aspects of construction, there is concern that there is too much focus on administration. Furthermore, anecdotal evidence and the findings of audits indicates that there should be more focus on risk management and hazard identification and risk assessment.2013 and 2014 Regional H&S competition award winners were surveyed using a self-administered questionnaire delivered per e-mail.The salient findings include: cost, quality, and time are marginally more important than H&S to the respondents’ organisations; hazard identification and risk assessment (HIRA), and risk management are critical; worker participation, H&S education, H&S training, construction H&S management competencies, supervision, management, and construction management competencies are important, and are all predictors of H&S performance, which manifests itself in the physical state of H&S, and 50 / 52 (96.2%) of aspects / interventions / stakeholders contributed to respondents’ organisations achieving an H&S competition award to a major as opposed to a minor extent, and therefore a multi-content ‘cocktail’ is required to optimise H&S performance.Emphasis should be placed on HIRA assessment, and risk management. Auditing should focus on predictors of H&S performance such as H&S practitioners, hazard identification and risk assessment, and interventions that contribute to a ‘healthy’ H&S culture, and which result in a ‘healthy’ H&S climate such as management commitment, supervision, and worker participation.