Health and Safety

The rules around health and safety practices in the UK are quite different than they are in the U.S. I’m sure there are rules in the U.S. but normally the average employee in a commercial office setting doesn’t come in contact with them. Buried in my inbox was a requirement from our Health and Safety Officer at work to attend one of the many Health and Safety required sessions. I accidentally ignored it. One day as people were filing into a conference room, I made the mistake of asking the Officer what it was all about. I thought she was going to kill me. The response was that ALL employees had to attend so I better mark my diary!

So finally, I got my butt into one of the courses. It was comprised of two presentations, the latter was a fire prevention movie which actually was very interesting and something that anyone should watch, but the first one was hilarious. It was called “Stay Alive from 9 to 5” and it was all about workplace accidents. Now all I can think about is people getting hit in the head with a tape dispenser that gets knocked off from somewhere on high or someone accidentally falling out of a three-story window. According to the video, danger is around every corner at work. While workplace accidents might be minimal, the near misses are extremely high! I found myself having to think of a really sad event in my life and biting the inside of my mouth to avoid smiling and laughing during the meeting. I do have a habit of laughing at inappropriate things and I was afraid once I started, I wouldn’t be able to stop.