Risk Management of Oxfordshire Fire and Rescue Service - Case Study Example

Name : xxxxxxxxxxx Institution : xxxxxxxxxxx Course : xxxxxxxxxxx Title : Risk Management Tutor : xxxxxxxxxxx @2010 Risk management Introduction Risk management is the process of identifying and assessing a risk. This helps in determining the level of the priority that the resources needed to manage it can be given.. In an area whereby students are accommodated, there are many different risks which are prone to it although the risk of fire is the leading. This is mostly cost by the lifestyle of the students among others and if not well taken care of it can result to serious consequences. Oxfordshire Fire and Rescue service is an example of organization which serves to rescue or manage the risks which are likely to occur in the students hostels (Kemshall & Pritchard, 2006). Risk assessment A risk assessment is cautious examination of potential causes of harms, the people they are likely to affect and the possible measures to be taken against these hazards. It is an important step which enhances the whole process of managing a risk. Every year a number of risks of fire are reported in a local centre where the students are accommodated and Oxford fire and rescue service is an organization whose objective is to reduce the number of fires that occurs in these centers or are struggling to find ways of reducing the severity of the effects of these risks. The management of this organization is concern about ways of ensuring that safety conditions of the students living in the local accommodation centers as these places are much prone to many risks caused by the lifestyles of the residents. While undertaking the process of risk assessments, the organization considered the five steps involved. These are: identifying the hazards, deciding those who might be harmed and how they can be harmed, evaluation of the risks and decisions on possible precautions, recording the findings and discovering ways of implementing them and lastly regularly reviewing the assessment to ensure that whatever to entails is effective. These factors are applicable to all types of assessments considered (Dempster, 2002). Assessment of risks occurring in the student’s accommodation center So as to make an effective risk assessment process, the organization had to start by considering the first step of considering the hazards which are the potential causes of the risks. The potential fire risk hazards can either be natural or artificial and these includes: electricity, mishandling of some of the explosives like oxygen, packing of rooms with equipments containing elements which easily catch fire like hydrocarbons in Televisions and computers and furniture made of wood. The students may carelessly dispose papers and textiles which may highly influence the spread of fire and the drunkard smoke carelessly from anywhere causing most of the risks. The congestion of the small rooms in the building and the properties of each student can enhance the spread of the fire and its severity explosiveness of burning and cause difficulties trying to put it off. These and others factors in the community of students and teenagers are causes of most of the risks occurring in them, especially the risk of fire. The occurrence of these risks may affect many people who are exposed to various hazards. The students residing in these centers may either be burnt as they struggle to rescue themselves and their properties, may loose their properties or may have health complications as result of inhaling excess smoke. Those in the neighborhood or surrounding may be hurt by the exploring blocks of building; they may also be affected by the pollution of the environment by the smoke and gases produced by fires. The rescuers may be burnt as they try to rescue the students from the risk, they may also suffer health problems as a result of inhaling excess poisonous gases. The owners of the building suffer the economic losses when renovating or putting up new buildings, they also have to meet the costs of hiring the rescue services. To prevent the occurrence of the risk and the harm it is likely to cause, various factors have to be put in place against each hazard. The management of the organization should always ensure that the conditions of the electricity are regularly maintained to prevent it from causing any risk of fire. The students should be trained on the better ways of handling substances which can easily cause fire or burn in explosives like excess oxygen. The oxygen used for domestic purposes can be poisonous if not handled with care, this because it burns with explosives especially when in a tight ore squeezed enclosure as a result of the increased pressure hence the explosions as the hot air tries to find its way out. The students should be discouraged from packing their rooms with elements which contains hydrocarbons. Hydrocarbons easily get fire and burns with explosives; they also easily spread fire to the building and cause the buildings to completely burn down. The rubbish and other substances like clothes should be well disposed to prevent them from spreading fire; if they are burnt the fires should not be left open but should be put off. The management should consider including a smoking zone for the students who smoke and put up spacious rooms so as to ensure that the pressure inside is reduced and also to ease the work of the rescuers (Kemshall & Pritchard, 2006). When evaluating the risks and considering the precautions, it is necessary to look at the potential severity harm of the hazard and working out the risk level through categorizing the likelihood of the occurrence of the harm. This helps to determine which risk should be tackled first depending on the level of the causing the harm. The matrix method is the best for determining these factors. The likelihood harm occurring can either be highly unlikely, unlikely or likely and the potential severity of each can be trivial, tolerable, moderate or substantial. This process is suitable for many assessments and especially for the complex situations; however it should be carefully carried out to ensure the results got are correct so as to apply the necessary controls. All the above hazards and the ways of controlling them should be well recorded and ways of implementing them formulated to ensure that their intended purpose is achieved. This is accompanied by an action plan containing what has to be done, at what time, who to do it and how to do it. The management should always make a follow up to ensure that all their plans are meet. This step should involve all the personnel officers so as to give them a chance of giving their views concerning the ways of implementing their plan of action. The last step of risk assessment is regularly reviewing the action plan or the information got from the process of risk assessment so as to ensure that they are most effective for the most recent local risk hazards and the ways of controlling them. For example, road accidents are the most recent risks causing the death of most of the people or affecting their health conditions. Any rescue organization should consider it and the potential hazards of causing it; these should go hand in hand with the ways of controlling the hazards. All the shareholders of an organization should be involved when carrying out this process so as to give them a chance of giving their opinions concerning the necessary improvements on the process of risk management. Risk assessment should be carried out by the person who is familiar with the environment where the activity takes place or the whole activity with enough knowledge and understanding so as to be able to discover all possible hazards of causing the risks. The assessor should be able to recognize the limitation of the hazards and be set to seek the necessary advice concerning them (Dempster, 2002). Risk assessment Sheet Expected Hazards Individuals Harmed Action to be undertaken Further Action Who takes action When to take Action Electronic appliances Students and staff Switching off appliances after use Proper use and connection of appliances to prevent blowing up of appliances Students Smoking Students and staff, Improper handling of cigarette Administration should burn smoking in rooms Establishing smoking zones Administration Cooking Students and staff careless handling of appliances such as not switching off cookers Prohibiting cooking in rooms Organizing frequent inspection if the students abide by the regulation Administration Beddings and blankets, pillows Mattresses Students and staff. The Items can easily catch fire in case of an outbreak Keeping beddings away from fire heat sources such as candles No further action Students Extension codes Students , lack of proper of circuit breakers Ensuring that every extension codes have proper circuits Ban the use of extension cords that do not have in-built circuit breakers Administration and students Fabrics Students Keeping away fabrics from heat sources Hanging clothes in the closets Students Candles Students , leaving burning candles during the night Using candles should be prohibited No further action Students Excessive oxygen Students Installing adequate fire extinguishers in rooms No further action Administration Loose cables Students and staff Repairing of all loose cables Making sure that cables are well fixed before use Administration and students Inadequate emergency exit Students Installation of more emergency exits within the centers Ensuring that the exists can be quickly opened incase of emergencies Administration Garbage dispersal Staff and students Proper disposal of garbage because they are also likely to catch fire Not exposing garbage to fire sources Students Grills for Barbeque Staff and students Barbeque grills should not be 300 feet near students accommodation centers Compressed gas tankers and charcoal barbecue grills should not be stored near the accommodation units Administration and students Fire Staff and students Educating students on fire prevention strategies Carry out a full risk assessment and implementing its proposals Administration Types of risk assessment The process of risk management is classified into various types based on the intended purposes, these are: Generic, specific and dynamic. Generic is common in activities with standard measures set to minimize the risks associated with the concern hazard. Specific type is considered when the generic is found not to be effective. It is mostly the best for the risks caused by hazards which are so specific on the kind of the activity that is involved. For example if a risk occurs after the position of the resource is changed then the hazard is related to the activity of changing the position. The dynamic type is whereby all the efforts are made to make sure that appropriate and adequate assessments of risks concerning all the predicted risks are prepared in advance of any step forward of the whole activity. This should be done depending on the present condition of the issue and not on the recorded information of the past processes of risk assessment. It is carried out by a responsible person or one who can be accountable for that which is being assessed. The person carrying out the dynamic assessment should be competent in the issues relating to the process and be able to produce a written record or revise the document held on the records. The measures in the processes of risk management can result to complicated risks if necessary amendments are not made (AXA, 2003). Health & Safety legislation The British health and safety law Act 1974 sets out some general safety duties of employers towards the employees and of employees to themselves. The law requires that good management guided by common sense which would enable the employers to discover into details what risk is and determine the possible measures against them. The management and safety at work regulations 1999 explains more on what the employers need to do to manage health and safety measures for their employees at work. The employers are mainly required to carry out an assessment of the possible risks and record the important results of the process. This should be straightforward in a simple workplace targeting minor risks like fires but complex if the hazards are complicated like nuclear bombs or chemical plant. It is the duty of the employers to always: implements the safety measures considered as important by the process of risk management, assign competent people to help them implement the recommendations, provide necessary information and train their workers on what is expected of them to ensure that there is good security. Set up emergency procedures incase a risk occurs which they did not expected or that which was not included in the assessment and be willing to work together as staffs of the same organization to easily recognize the hazards which can easily occur in their working environment and the risks they are likely to cause. This can also help them to recognize the resources in the organization which they can use to control or prevent these risks. Other safety regulations require action responding to particular hazards or in organizations whose activities contains many health hazards. Modern safety hazards in Britain involving much of that fro Europe is based on the principles of risk assessments. The safety and health commission and its Executive have spent over 20 years trying to modernize the structure of the law of safety with an objective of protecting the health, welfare and safety of the employees and to safeguard others who are likely to be affected by an occurrence of a risk (Health and safety Executive, 1999). Fire & Rescue Services Act 2004 According to this Act, prevention is the core of all the fire and rescue services as occurrence of the risks affects the economic growth of a community or has some negative impacts on the running of the activities of an organization. Thus new duties for all the fire and rescue services organizations should be set to ensure security of all communities especially those that are more prone to these risks. So as to help save more lives, the Act imposes a new duty of all the rescue organizations to promote fire safeties. This requires them to adapt a good risk assessment and prevention approach which helps to reduce the occurrences of risks. The Act also comes up with new packages of powers and duties of these organizations to meet the needs of a modern Fire and Rescue Services. This covers the most recent activities. The Act is concerned with the strategic vision and engagement that is the government should set a Fire and Rescue National Framework. The Act updates the past powers to combine the rescue services with the economy, efficiency and effectiveness. These and some of the others like civil resilience, equipment, negotiating bodies and engaging stakeholders are the new things that the Act came up with concerning the safety measures (UK’s Parliamentary Committee, 2004). Fire & Rescue service Integrated Risk Management Plan The Authority of the Oxfordshire Fire and Rescue services introduces the Integrated Risk and Management plan for the year 2010-2011with an intensive program of prevention, protection and intervention strategies. The main aim is to save lives and prevent damages to resources and properties. It has a highly competent and committed workforce which ensures that the expected services are delivered to excellent standards. The organization possesses various skills and knowledge in different areas such as community education by prevention measures and implementing legislation to make sure that people are safe from risks. The action plan contains some optional projects: The day crewing review at Abingdon and Didcot fire stations whose objective is to improve the general balance of fire cover and resilience country wide. The second project is on special appliance review and specialists ability to rescue and the objective is to review the specialists appliances within the organization Project 3 is on the operational staff to deliver to the obligations, the forth is the review of the arrangements of the corresponded with Central Ambulance Services, the fifth is to review the prevention and risk reduction, the sixth is operational resilience review and the last is the local government standard of equality. Their objectives are relevant although they are based on the general goal of the organization (Oxfordshire fire and rescue services, 2008). The plan forms a basis of an effective fire and services because its projecti9ves are updated on the most recent local needs. Conclusion Fire is among the risks that affect most of the activities in the community and rescue services have been formed to fight the risk or prevent it. These organizations should consider some processes like assessments which enable them to discover the possible hazards and the necessary measures to control them. They should also have an Integrated Risk Management plan which will act as a guide while carrying out the activities. Bibliography Health and safety Executive, 1999, Health and Safety, Health and Safety Executive, Oxford. Oxfordshire fire and rescue services, 2008, Integrated Risk Mnagement plan, Service Delivery Headquarters Sterling Rd Kidlington, Oxford UK’s Parliamentary Committee, 2004, Fire and Rescue Services Act 2004, Office of the Deputy Prime, West Yorkshire. AXA, 2003, Risk assessment, UK. Dempster M., 2002, Risk management: value at risk and beyond, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. Kemshall H. & Pritchard J.,2006, Good practice in risk assessment and risk management, William Andrew, Oxford. Read More