Asbestos Awareness Within the Construction Industry

Abstract

"This dissertation focuses on analysing how awareness is raised within the construction industry and how the Health and Safety Executive focus on providing the industry with the relevant knowledge regarding asbestos in order to keep everyone up to date. The literature review provides an introduction into the subject of asbestos, highlighting the different types of asbestos that can be found, and the law regarding asbestos and how the Health and Safety act when providing information on asbestos to the construction industry. Environmental factors are also highlighted in this chapter which discuss the effects of asbestos on the surroundings. The investigation of asbestos was carried out through questionnaires which were handed out manually to 60 different participants. These questionnaires asked questions regarding asbestos awareness and factors such as how the HSE provide information, as well as how useful the information is. Once they were handed back, the questionnaires were then analysed. The results of the questionnaires gave a clear indication that the construction industry are not aware of asbestos and its dangers as they should be. The figures suggested that the majority of the respondents weren’t full aware of how dangerous asbestos is when coming into contact with it on site. A small number of the respondents had never even received asbestos related training which is rather alarming. Later on through the investigation id was clear that the best way of improving asbestos awareness is through asbestos related training as the respondents who had been on training courses were to a certain extent, more knowledgeable about asbestos than those who had never received training. In conclusion to the investigation it is visible that the respondents aren’t aware of asbestos as the Health and Safety Executive make out. More work could be carried out to further investigate the matter, but it is clear that the HSE should organise asbestos awareness training to educate workers on the subject matter.