Safety in all tongues
April 1st 2008 Over a third of contract cleaning workers are migrants, and the number is rising.
Language can be a barrier to safe working practice.With this in mind,Safety Media has
launched Health & Safety for Cleaners,a multi-lingual training DVD in 20 languages
There are an estimated one million people employed as cleaners
throughout the UK economy, and a substantial proportion of
them do not have English as their first language.Cleaners carry
out a wide range of duties that are essential to the smooth running of
any organisation, and many of these are potentially dangerous.
In 2005/06 there were approximately 3500 work related accidents to
cleaners reported to the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) and Local
Authorities.Over 700 of these accidents were classified as major
injuries, such as dislocations or broken bones.
The most common types of reported accidents to cleaners were
slips and trips; musculoskeletal disorders,particularly injury to backs
and upper limbs caused by manual handling; and falls from height.
Others include contact with harmful substances such as detergents,
soaps, caustic soda, disinfectants, bleaches, cleaning fluids, and
ammonia, leading to a risk of occupational dermatitis; being hit by
falling objects; and contact with moving machinery.
And, as many accidents are never reported to the authorities, the
actual number is likely to be considerably higher than this figure,
making proper training for cleaners essential.
A survey of contract cleaning companies conducted in 2007 by
Asset Skills, the Sector Skills Council for the cleaning industry, found
that 37% of employees working within cleaning companies were
migrant workers, a proportion that is increasing, especially since the
accession of East European countries into the EU in 2004. Says Asset
Skills, the main limitation to both employment and the role
undertaken by migrant workers within a cleaning company is the
language barrier, particularly the lack of ability in spoken English.
With this in mind, Safety Media has launched Health & Safety for
Cleaners, the newest addition to its range of Multi-Lingual DVDs, to
give advice on avoiding injury to cleaners in their own languages.
The DVD will train your cleaners in a choice of 20 different subtitled
languages including English, and so is ideal for any company with
workers who are not native English speakers. It follows a cleaner
through their working day and demonstrates the possible hazards
they could face in the course of their job.
The DVD covers:
Appropriate work wear and personal protective equipment
Ongoing dynamic risk assessments
How to avoid repetitive strain injuries
How to lift correctly
Safe use of chemical substances
Push rather than pull
Tripping hazards
Hand arm vibration
It is available in the following subtitled languages:
Albanian, Bengali, Chinese, Czech, English, French,German
Gujarati, Hindi, Italian, Kurdish, Polish, Portuguese, Punjabi
Russian, Spanish,Tamil,Turkish, Urdu and Welsh.
The pack comes complete with 50 Risk Assessment forms and 10
Health & Safety for Cleaners Training Booklets.
"This latest addition to our multi-lingual range of training media
will ensure the health, safety and welfare of your valuable, but
vulnerable, cleaning staff by making sure they fully understand how
to avoid accidents and injury," said Julian Roberts, managing director
of Safety Media.
The dangers of workplace slips, trips and falls are the focus of the
HSE's Shattered Lives campaign, which is running in February and
March 2008, focusing on slips, trips and falls and upon those most
likely to become victims of them.
The DVD costs 199 and comes with 10 H&S for Cleaners Training
Booklets and Risk Assessment
Forms.
Reader offer – free DVD
Safety Media is giving away a free copy of Health & Safety for
Cleaners to the first Cleaning Matters reader to email:
helen.shields@safetymedia.co.uk
The company has numerous training products available to
meet the needs of a changing industry. For example, with 33,905
Polish workers joining the UK workforce in the second quarter of
2007 alone, its 30 minute Manual Handling and Fire Safety
E-Learning courses in Polish, can quickly and cost effectively
bring staff up to speed with UK requirements More articles from Safety Media Ltd: | 
