BAF Highlight Safety Shortcomings

New accreditation scheme sets standards for abrasives safety training

The leading manufacturers of abrasive products fear that proper training in their safe use is being overlooked. It is often the result of confusion due to changes in legislation that have affected the burden of responsibility on both users and distributors of abrasives. Inadequate training from specialist providers is also an issue.

The British Abrasive Federation (BAF) states that its members’ products meet or exceed the highest worldwide safety standards. However, despite the huge effort, that goes into the design and production of safe abrasives, when technical staffs from manufacturers are called into investigate accidents involved their products, they find that the cause is often due to poorly trained operators and products being incorrectly mounted or used.

In an effort to resolve the problem, BAF has decided that clear guidelines are required on who should be trained and to what standard if accidents involving abrasive tools are to be reduced.

Chairman of the BAF, Dr Bill Gilmour, said, “Unless purchasers of abrasives are given the correct information as to their obligations to train not only operators and users but also specifiers and buyers, then the incidence is unlikely to reduce.”

The next step is to ensure that the training being delivered dramatically improves and to that end, BAF has brought together a group of leading experts within the abrasive industry. Using guidance from the Health & Safety Executive and PUWER (Provision and Use of Work Equipment regulations 1998), together with its combined experience of recorded accidents, the team has devised a standard stipulating the content and delivery to which all abrasives safety training programmes should adhere.

Kentec are proud to have been granted accreditation by the British Abrasives Federation to provide operator training courses in the safe use of abrasive products. We see this as a step closer to abrasive wheel training been facilitated in a structured, effective and professional manner.