There are 300 cards in existence from over 40 certification schemes, a number of which have inconsistent and incompatible requirements and meanings, says the report.
The recommendation is one of the main messages in A commentary on routes to competence in the construction sector, published today by the HSE.
The authority would have responsibility for monitoring and accrediting card schemes and maintaining a database of card holders and their achievements. Its establishment might have a very positive effect on the levels of confidence of the general public and of employers generally, says the report, which was prepared by Pye Tait Consulting with the support of the HSE and Construction Skills.
The researchers point out that the industry's health and safety record has improved. Health and safety education in the UK construction industry is underpinned by two main conceptual approaches: a systems and regulatory approach introduced in the mid-1960s and a "competence" approach, from the late 1980s). Both have made very significant contributions to these improvements in the industry's health and safety record, says the report.
The construction industry has developed a system of regulations, qualifications, courses, skills cards, safety passports and competent person schemes. "More by accident than by design, the system so developed has turned out to be complex and fragmented," says the report. "Added to this picture, whilst take-up of the industry's NVQs/SVQs has increased substantially over the last ten years, a significant proportion remains without such a qualification. This situation may be having counter-productive impacts including hidden costs, and creating, for many employers, the semblance of "competence" where it may not exist," it says.
"It is impossible to distinguish and disentangle the effects of the skills cards, safety passports and competent person schemes from the ongoing impact of regulation and competence to be able to identify a distinct causal effect on health and safety performance. However, without doubt the current status of this complexity and fragmentation suggests that a clearer system - one which requires standardising and rationalising card certification schemes to achieve a much more reliable and transparent evidencing of competence might well provide the basis for further improvement. All such cards should be based on achievement of a nationally-recognised, formal qualification to which other related-sectors' formal qualifications are mapped, and published, to aid clarity."
The construction industry should move to an approach that requires not just occupational (job) competence, but more robust general health & safety competence throughout an operative's working life. "Evidence points to at least the possibility that human factors - particularly for those aged over 50 - may be a significant cause of accidents and that a focus on human factors and on this age group may well save a significant number of lives in the sector," says the report.
The report can be downloaded from the HSE at www.hse.gov.uk/research/rrhtm/rr877.htm
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