Lifting Regulations and Standards: How They Fit Together

Law

Acts and Regulations

An Act is passed by Parliament. For lifting, the main one is the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974. It puts general duties on employers to protect their employees and anyone else affected by their work, so far as is reasonably practicable, and it puts duties on employees too.

Regulations are made under an Act. The Secretary of State makes health and safety regulations under section 15 of the 1974 Act, and each set deals with a particular hazard or kind of work. LOLER covers lifting operations and lifting equipment. PUWER covers work equipment of every kind, cranes and accessories included. CDM 2015 adds duties when a lift is part of a construction project, and the Work at Height Regulations apply wherever someone could fall far enough to be injured.

Breaking the law can lead to an improvement notice from an inspector, or to prosecution. An inspector can also serve a prohibition notice to stop an activity that risks serious personal injury, whether or not the law has been broken.

HSE enforces the law on most industrial and construction sites. Local authorities enforce it on premises such as offices, shops, warehouses and hotels, as set out in the Health and Safety (Enforcing Authority) Regulations 1998. Some construction work, including notifiable projects, is enforced by HSE even on those premises.

ACOPs

Approved Codes of Practice

An Approved Code of Practice, or ACOP, gives practical advice on how to comply with a set of Regulations. HSE approves each one with the consent of the Secretary of State, under section 16 of the 1974 Act.

The special legal status comes from section 17. Not following an ACOP is not an offence in itself. If you are prosecuted for breaching the Regulations it covers, though, and the court finds you did not follow the relevant part of the ACOP, you will be found at fault unless you can show you complied with the law in some other way. HSE explains this on its page on the legal status of HSE guidance and ACOPs.

The ACOP for lifting is L113, Safe use of lifting equipment, which supports LOLER. L22, Safe use of work equipment, does the same for PUWER. Each one prints the ACOP text and HSE guidance together in a single book.

Guidance

HSE guidance

HSE guidance explains the law and how to meet it in plainer terms than the Regulations themselves. It ranges from free leaflets to detailed technical books. Following it is not compulsory unless the guidance says so, but HSE’s position is that if you follow it you will normally be doing enough to comply with the law.

Inspectors can refer to guidance as an example of good practice when they look at how a risk has been controlled. You are free to use another method, as long as it controls the risk at least as well.

Standards

British, European and international standards

A standard is a published document setting out an agreed way of doing something, written by committees of experts from industry, government, public bodies and consumer groups. In the UK, standards are published by BSI, the national standards body. They are voluntary: a standard only becomes compulsory when a law or a contract calls it up.

Working to the relevant standard is a recognised way to show that a lift has been planned and carried out properly, and our lifts are planned to BS 7121.

Code of practice or specification

A specification sets out requirements, written with “shall”, and how to check that a product or service conforms. The product standards for lifting accessories set requirements in this way, such as BS EN 818 for short link lifting chain and chain slings. A code of practice gives recommendations, written with “should”. The BS 7121 series, the code of practice for safe use of cranes, is the best known example in lifting.

A British Standard written in the UK normally names its type in the title, such as “Code of practice” or “Specification”. European and international standards may not, so the wording inside is the guide: “shall” marks a requirement and “should” marks a recommendation.

BSI also publishes guides, which give broad information on a subject rather than detailed requirements, along with test methods and vocabularies of terms.

What the prefixes mean

BS on its own means a standard written in the UK. BS EN is a European standard, agreed through CEN, or CENELEC for electrical standards, and published here by BSI, which has remained a full member of both since Brexit. BS ISO is an international standard published by BSI without change, and BS EN ISO is one that has also been adopted as a European standard. Some are known by their ISO number alone, such as ISO 4309 for the inspection and discard of crane wire ropes.

Every standard carries the year of its edition, as in BS 7121-1:2016. Standards are revised, split into parts, replaced or withdrawn over time, so check you are working to the current edition.

Industry

Industry guidance

Trade associations publish guidance of their own, from codes of practice and best practice guides to training and certification schemes. LEEA publishes a code of practice for the safe use of lifting equipment. The CPA publishes best practice guides on cranes and other plant, and ALLMI publishes guidance on lorry loaders, some of it jointly with the CPA.

Industry guidance has no legal status of its own. It is written by people in the industry and records what the trade treats as good practice.

Series

Every guide in the series

Each guide covers one Act or set of Regulations, one standard, one guidance document or one industry body, grouped by kind below.

Questions

Common questions

Related

Related services and guides

Our crane hire and contract lifting and machine movement services cover the planning as well as the lift itself. Call us on 0800 008 6096 or email office@synergy-lifting.co.uk with the details of your job.