CHEMICAL CONFERENCE LIVE ‘08
October 1st 2008

Some of the leading names in Chemical health and safety will come together under one roof at Birmingham City FC on November 26th for a one day conference. Health and Safety Matters talks to the event organisers to see why Chemical Conference Live ‘08, was created and what it will cover Chemicals are the driving force of British Industry. Every year, millions of tonnes of industrial chemicals help to keep British businesses across almost every industry sector running smoothly.

While they are essential for business, chemicals also present significant worker hazards and are one of the biggest health and safety challenges for managers and business owners. With up to 10,000 commercial chemicals classified as hazardous, those with the responsibility for worker safety are often understandably hard pressed to ensure they are providing staff working with chemicals with the right level of protection.

Where worker contact with any harmful substances is concerned, the ideal scenario would be to remove any contact between worker and chemical, but the reality is that in many circumstances this is neither practical or possible, leaving the health and safety manager to ensure the right type and level of protection is provided across all aspects of the PPE process.

Add to this the new REACH Directive which effects every business working with chemicals – from hairdressers through to industrial chemical manufacturers – and it is easy to understand how managing health and safety where chemicals are concerned can be so challenging.

To help address this, three of Europe’s leading names in PPE have come together along with one of the leading names in Health and Safety Law and the UK REACH Compliance team to deliver a one day conference on managing chemicals where health and safety is concerned. According to Donald Gillespie of Marigold Industrial, bringing together the leading names in chemical PPE at a single conference had been a regular topic of conversation within the company for a number of years: “We’ve long talked about the benefits to the end user of bringing together leading manufacturer knowledge under one roof in a conference style event. We basically decided to stop talking about it and go ahead and do it,” said Donald “Manufacturers have such a wealth of knowledge and advice that they are a major educational and informational resource for those people with the challenge of ensuring the health and safety of employees. But this resource is often not utilised enough by end users. When we sat down and considered an event of this type, we felt that chemicals played such a significant role in a wide range of businesses, and were such a challenge for health and safety managers, that this was an issue where we could bring some real, measurable help and advice to end users where PPE was concerned – and so Chemical Conference Live ‘08 was born,” he added.

In addition to bringing other leading manufacturers in the PPE market – safety footwear specialists Jal-Group and respiratory, head and face protection leaders Scott Health and Safety, Chemical Conference Live 08 will also see presentations on health and safety law by Lawrence West QC of Henderson Chambers, one of the UK’s leading names in health and safety law and the REACH Regulations, by members of the UK REACH Compliance team: “When you think about just how many businesses in the UK have staff that work with chemicals – the vast majority of which are hazardous to health – covering everything from skin damage and burns through to asphyxiation, PPE is an absolutely vital element in worker safety. But identifying and understanding the chemicals that people are working with, how hazardous they are, how people are working with them and in what environment is often anything but a straightforward process.

“So Chemical Conference Live ‘08 brings experts together at one event to cover everything from head and face, respiratory, hand and arm and foot/slip and trip protection highlighting the key issues and helping increase awareness and understanding of them and arm those with responsibility for health and safety with the tools and information to meet their responsibilities,” added Donald.

“We are absolutely delighted to also have members of the UK REACH Compliance team talking about the new regulations and their impact on COSHH in addition to Lawrence West QC, to create what we think will be an extremely valuable and insightful event for business owners, health and safety managers, facilities managers and anyone involved in the health and safety process.”

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