Safety Schemes in Procurement Newsletter April 2015 In this edition: Our mission is to facilitate mutual recognition between health and safety pre-qualification schemes, wherever it is practicable to do so. The Safety Schemes in Procurement Forum (SSIP) was launched in May 2009 with the active support of the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) and stakeholders, key trade associations, certification bodies and others across the construction industry. SSIP chairman John Kinge welcomes you to the latest news from SSIP CDM 2015 new guidance highlights role of SSIP Online SSIP Portal gives free access to information about supplier certification Benefits to buyers of SSIP Safety Schemes in Procurement Forum T: +44 (0)131 442 6612 E: ssip@aps.org.uk SSIP Forum, Suite 3, 5 New Mart Place, Edinburgh EH14 1RW Personal view founder member Constructionline s experience of SSIP
Page 2 April 2015 Chairman s Welcome and Introduction Welcome to the latest SSIP newsletter a particularly important edition because it coincides with the launch of the newly-revised Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2015, and plans to review PAS 91, the construction pre-qualification draft standard. In addition, this edition highlights the commercial benefits of SSIP to clients, with special emphasis on SSIP s free online Portal, which allows buyers to find out easily which suppliers meet the requirements of SSIP member assessment. As chair of SSIP, I am continually encouraged to see that, through effective collaboration, fewer organisations have to repeat the time and cost of demonstrating compliance with what the industry has defined as core health and safety PQQ requirements. Incorporation of these core criteria into SSIP's Terms of Reference is already making a major contribution to ensuring PQQ consistency in construction, and beyond. I believe that with heightened awareness of PAS 91, combined with the growth of SSIP, procurement of construction services will become even more transparent and less bureaucratic. The new-look CDM Regulations will once again put the spotlight on how buyers can best assess the capability of their suppliers, whether they are principal designers, contractors, or consultants. I am also greatly encouraged by the continuing support shown by the HSE for SSIP, and the references in the new guidance to the CDM 2015 Regulations to how SSIP can be used to help buyers and suppliers (see page 3). SSIP continues to work hard to reduce PQQ bureaucracy and, through the SSIP Portal, it has just enabled buyer access to a validation database of approved contractors at no charge. To find out more, see page 4. On behalf of SSIP, I would like send this message to buyers, suppliers and others with an interest in health and safety PQQs and wider assurance: SSIP not only has a clear mission, it is actively pursuing continual improvement. If you have any comments, ideas or suggestions about how we can do more to improve the PQQ and assurance landscape, we are listening. Whatever your comments, we very much welcome your feedback. John Kinge MAJOR BENEFITS FOR BUYERS WHO CHOOSE AND USE SSIP In construction procurement, one of the buyer s key responsibilities is to take reasonable steps to ensure that the suppliers they appoint (notably, contractors or consultants) can do their work safely. This responsibility can be partly discharged through asking health and safety pre-qualification questions (PQQs), or using a pre-qualification scheme offered by SSIP members to do this for them. A key aim of SSIP is to facilitate mutual recognition between health and safety pre-qualification schemes and thus reduce duplication and wasted effort in the supply chain. Much of this is achieved through the effective crossrecognition of PQQ assessment activity between member schemes. Ultimately, the success of cross-recognition depends on the understanding and behaviour of clients, main contractors and other buyers. By making information about a supplier's SSIP certification freely available to buyers via the free online Portal, SSIP is removing the need for buyers to inadvertently run wasteful, and often duplicated, assessment schemes. We are keen to work with any buyer who would like to know more about the business and other benefits of recognising suppliers who are already assessed by SSIP members. More business reasons to engage with SSIP can be found on page 4.
April 2015 Page 3 CDM 2015 guidance highlights role of SSIP The Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2015 (CDM 2015) came into force on 6 April. The newly revised Regulations underline just how widely CDM applies, bringing in new duties for smaller suppliers in particular, and introducing new legal parlance to describe supplier capability. The recently published L series guidance 1 shows that CDM 2015 will apply to micro and small to medium-sized contractors more than ever. Under CDM, construction already covers a broad range of work, including building refurbishment and maintenance. However, under the revised Regulations, when more than one contractor is anticipated, the job or project will (in addition to having the usual designer and contractor duty-holders) also need a principal contractor and a principal designer, both to be appointed by the client (buyer). Designers and contractors (including individuals and thus sole traders) must be able to show they have the necessary health and safety skills, knowledge and experience to do the work. This applies to individuals working for larger organisations, or for themselves in particular, self-employed designers. Designers or contractors can use the services of an independent (third party) assessor to assess their organisational capability. There are companies that provide pre-qualification assessment services, including those who are members of the Safety Schemes in Procurement Forum. This is an umbrella body with binding agreements in place to ensure member schemes recognise each other s pre-qualification assessments. A web portal provides free access to search for any business that has undergone an SSIP assessment. SSIP member assessment is one way in which a designer or contractor can demonstrate organisational capability at the prequalification stage of the appointment process [...] Individual and organisational capability Under CDM 2015, anyone who carries out a duty-holder role needs to have the skills, knowledge, experience and, where relevant, the organisational capability to carry out the role (or additional roles). Significantly, the word competence is no longer used in the CDM guidance. The HSE s take on requirements in regulation 8 to CDM 2015 is that skills, knowledge and experience is the mantra for what to look for from individuals, while organisational capability is required from organisations. The HSE regards the SSIP health and safety core criteria (also shown in PAS 91 2 ) as a benchmark for assessing organisational capability. In total, seven draft guidance documents have been drawn up by the HSE and CONIAC, the industry advisory body. While the HSE s 80- page L series guide provides the most authoritative pointer, the more practical CONIAC guides are aimed at occasional clients and smaller contractors. The HSE s L series guide has the following to say about the appointment of contractors and consultants: According to Joe Laverick, MD of SMAS Ltd: A significant implication for PQQs of the new CDM Regulations is the removal of Appendix 4 in the previous CDM ACoP, which set out the core criteria for assessing a contractor s basic capability. However, with the support of the HSE, the core criteria have now been adopted by SSIP, so clear requirements for contractors will continue. SSIP members will continue to adopt the same criteria and recognise each other s certificate via the SSIP Deem to Satisfy route, wherever practicable. Eleanor Eaton, MD of CQMS Ltd, points out: SSIP members are currently working together to maximise the standardisation of any PQQ enquiries about the newly created CDM role of principal designer. The aim of this collaboration, as always, is to reduce waste and duplication for both clients and suppliers. 1 www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/books/l153.pdf 2 Publicly Available Specification 91, 2013: Constructionrelated procurement - Prequalification Questionnaires free at: http://shop.bsigroup.com/forms/pass/pas-91-2013
Page 4 April 2015 SSIP Portal your gateway to efficient health and safety procurement As a buyer, what would you say to an easy-to-access webpage, where you can type in a supplier s name and quickly confirm whether they hold a valid health and safety assessment from an SSIP Forum Member? No hassle, no time or money wasted, no more safety PQQs to send and, better yet, no more PQQs to evaluate! Just spend your precious time and resource doing something much more useful like getting straight on with the capability assessments for your specific project. And wouldn t it be good if, as an SSIP-assessed supplier, your prospective buyers public bodies, clients and main contractors could actually do this? Well, now they can via the free SSIP Portal. The Portal is a major output from SSIP. It enables any organisation to access shared information about supplier assessment to core criteria a significant benefit to the whole supply chain. Currently, the SSIP Portal holds essential information on more than 45,000 suppliers who have been assessed by SSIP Member Schemes. Member Schemes have a live feed into the Portal, so information is always up to date. Please feel free to sign up and start using this important supply-chain facility straight away. The sooner you do, the sooner we can all share in the commercial benefits of cross-recognition between SSIP Member Schemes. If you would like to find out more about using the SSIP Portal, contact Portal hosts Altius on 08445 616515, or visit www.ssipportal.org.uk New Portal features The Portal is free to access and open to all (conditions of use apply). It is being continually improved, and upcoming benefits include: Faster search results Improved security and stability 90% of data never more than 24 hours old New CDM 2015 assessment categories for both Principal Designer and Principal Contractor Inclusion of a beyond-construction category Free access at two levels: individual one-off searches, or register for multiple searches Portal will contain data concerning SSIP members Deemed To Satisfy certifications via mutual recognition Note: the SSIP Portal is an effective tool for checking SSIP assessment certification. It is not a search or sourcing tool for contractors, or other suppliers. Buyers, CDM and PAS 91 SSIP is specifically highlighted as a key route to health and safety pre-qualification in the 2013 edition of the Government-backed construction pre-qualification document PAS 91, and in the new HSE guidance to the CDM 2015 Regulations. As such, we strongly encourage buyers to consider the benefits of accepting an SSIP-assessed supplier without asking further general health and safety questions. This can save buyers considerable time and cost by removing the need to repeatedly assess responses to basic health and safety enquiries. Buyers should note that using SSIP schemes covers only general (often referred to as Stage 1) supplier capability it does not remove the necessity to make further enquiries about health and safety capability, as required for specific work. But it does free up time and resource for buyers to concentrate on more job-specific, supplementary (Stage 2) health and safety questions. Good supplementary questions are invaluable in supplier assessment for example, by finding out more about suppliers experience of specific work, or whether they have a suitably trained team and other resources to deliver health and safety on site.
April 2015 Page 5 The way I see it... Constructionline, now run entirely by Capita, is a founder member of SSIP, and it has actively designed the Constructionline experience to align fully with both SSIP and PAS 91. Philip Prince, sales and marketing director of Constructionline, shares his view of working with SSIP. From a standing start six years ago, the SSIP Forum has developed steadily and produced a number of significant and noteworthy results. Constructionline operates almost equally across public-sector and private-sector markets and offers a good snapshot of the commercial construction landscape. This snapshot clearly shows that, for the past two years, well over 90 per cent of our buyers, when writing to their supply chains, insist on/mandate a certificate from an SSIP Member Scheme as one of their requirements. A recent Constructionline buyer survey backs this up an amazing 96 per cent of private-sector buyers say they are aware of SSIP, and 69 per cent have adopted SSIP as their vehicle for health and safety assessment. Meanwhile, in the public sector, 86 per cent of buyers are aware of SSIP and 56 per cent have adopted it. Buyers appreciate that adopting SSIP gives them a greater choice of suppliers than insisting on a single scheme. For many, it is simply a no-brainer. In 2014, Constructionline buyers sent out more than 35,000 letters to suppliers recommending the use of an SSIP Member Scheme for their basic health and safety capability assessment. The various SSIP Member Schemes are to be praised for their work and commitment to the SSIP principles. There are always hurdles to overcome when commercial businesses attempt to work together for a common goal but, equally, the opportunity for a successful result is greatly magnified. I firmly believe that SSIP is now well established, and I am wholly confident that its influence will continue to grow. That s very much how I see the SSIP effect. This is further emphasised by the fact that, for buyers, SSIP is the most common search term used in the Constructionline system when sourcing new suppliers. The prominence of SSIP was clear when I sat on the PAS 91 Steering Committee back in 2012. It was easily accepted that a successful assessment by an SSIP Member Scheme should provide a valid exemption for the health and safety PQQs in PAS 91. This creates considerable efficiency for both Constructionline and its 24,000 supplier customers and, notably, the 60 per cent who simply upload their SSIP member-assessed certificate and then move straight on to the next required pre-qualification question!
Page 6 April 2015 SSIP Forum Membership Registered Member (Assessment) Schemes UKAS-accredited Registered Member Schemes * Acclaim Accreditation ACM Limited Altius Vendor Assessment ACS Registrars ARB Approved Contractor Scheme AJA Registrars Association for Project Safety BM TRADA Certification British Constructional Steelwork Association British Standards Institution Building & Engineering Services Association DNV Certification Contractors Health and Safety Assessment Scheme ERM Certification & Verification Services CQMS Safety Scheme IMS International D W Health & Safety Intertek Certification Limited Eurosafe UK ISOQAR Exor (Operated by Santia Accreditation) Greenlight Safety Consultancy LOR Contractors HSE Assessment Scheme MSL Property Care Services Lloyd s Register Quality Assurance NQA NSAI NSI Health and Safety Scheme National Accreditation Scheme for Safety & Health Ocean Certification National Association of Shopfitters SGS Systems & Services Certification Services National House-Building Council PICS Manual Audit SAFEcontractor (Operated by Santia Accreditation) Safe-T-Cert (Operated by Construction Employers Federation) Safety Management Advisory Services The Health and Safety Assessment Scheme Worksafe URS Certification Affiliate SSIP Members British Approvals for Fire Equipment Civil Engineering Contractors Association Constructionline Danny Sullivan Group Ltd Electrical Contractors Association National Specialist Contractors Council Specialist Engineering Contractors Group VolkerWessels UK * Under the deemed to satisfy (DTS) arrangement, schemes recognise UKASaccredited SSIP member certification to OHSAS 18001 in place of their own PQQ scheme (but not the other way round). Co-opted Members Construction Industry Council Health and Safety Executive Honorary co-opted member: John Murphy MBE - Founder chair (CHAS)