The Work at Height Regulations 2005

So what are these Regulations and how do they affect me?

In a single sentence, they say what the law wants you to do when planning or working at height as part of a job of work. They apply to everyone, employed, self-employed or contracted, but only at work. They don't apply when you're cleaning your windows at home, rock climbing, caving, bungee jumping or attempting the world record for domino-stacking, unless you're getting paid to do it!

The Regulations are an attempt to lay down sets of simple, universal rules on the way you work, the equipment you use, your training, planning and supervision. As with everything the idea of a 'universal rule' is never any good in the real world, and this is why the Work at Height Regulations have taken nearly four years to arrive, and even now they still look a little frayed around the edges!

The WAHR are the UK implementation of what has become known as the 'Temporary Work at Height Directive', an EU Council Directive given in 2001 and enacted on 19 July 2001. This has to be enacted into the national law of each member country, and in the UK, it has become the basis of the Work at Height Regulations.

To be technical, the Directive is actually called:

Directive 2001/45/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 June 2001 amending Council Directive 89/655/EEC concerning the minimum safety and health requirements for the use of work equipment by workers at work (second individual Directive within the meaning of Article 16(1) of Directive 89/391/EEC)

So, we'll call it the TWAHD! You can view the Directive HERE if you want.. it's not very long and it can be fun to compare (and contrast) it to the WAHR themselves.

The Regulations are actually quite thin (less than 20 pages if you snip off all the introductions) and as with a lot of new law coming from the EU, they're "assessment-based". In other words they try and avoid telling you legal facts and figures, and instead say you need to think about this or that, plan for it and work safely. The best example of this is the way the "2 metre rule" has been changed. This is the height at which a worker has to be before the Regulations start asking for safety systems to be in place:

The Old Regulations Said:
.. at a height of two metres.. - not 1.99, not 2.01. TWO. Heels and toes at 1.99m and you can ignore almost everything.

The New Regulations Say:
.. where, if measures required by these Regulations were not taken, a person could fall a distance liable to cause personal injury.. -

In other words, 2 metres is still probably a good starting point, but you're responsible for finding the safe limit for each situation you face at work. Some days it'll be three, others it'll be zero. Your call.

The content of the Regulations

The WAHR cover all aspects of working at height, and the planning of that work, from the best ways to organise jobs to the inspection of equipment used to do them. Although they are merely a tiny subset of the overall Health & Safety at Work Act, they cover pretty much everything 'height workers' need to do in one place. As such, if you plan your work to be 'WAHR compliant' you won't be caught out. Some of the Regulations are trivially simple to comply to (knowing you need a harness to climb a 500ft pylon is not rocket science) but others are actually extremely difficult to interpret, and will cause major hassle for some industry sectors.

The Regs deal with things in subject areas:

Organisation, planning and competence are in Reg 4-5 and talk about the needs to plan work safely, what you need to consider when planning work, and who is allowed to actually DO the work.

Avoidance of risks are covered by Reg 6 and basically ask that work is planned to be as safe as possible (so no working at height unless necessary, and then only by the safest methods).

Equipment is handled by Regs 7 and 8, and these go into great detail on the types of equipment you must use and how they must perform - such as the number of anchors, the methods of use, and so on. It covers PPE (harnesses and things) but also work platforms (scaffolds, MEWPs, etc) and ladders.

Fragile surfaces are clarified in Reg 9, saying how and when you're allowed to work on or near them.

Falling objects live in Regs 10 and 11, detailing how to protect people from risk, what exclusion zones and signage you need, and so on. These are actually incredibly strict and likely to cause problems with most types of work.

Inspection of equipment and workplaces are Regs 12 and 13. These are counted as 'serious' as they dramatically change the paperwork needed for ALL your height safety equipment, from harnesses and ropes to mobile platforms, scaffolding, ladders and even the buildings and towers themselves.

The Small Print follows in Regs 14-19 (and was also in 1-3), dealing with exemptions, amendments to other Acts and SIs, citations and so on.

As you can see, they're pretty all-encompassing! We've broken each section down on this website, and will explain them in detail.. so read on to find out all you need to know!

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