Health and safety regulations have once again been misinterpreted and seen to dampen Christmas spirit across the UK.
Prohibitive red tape is said to have forced a Bristol couple to abandon their Christmas lights display, which has transformed their home for 20 years. Bernard and Denise Lumsden have been told by the council to pay an extra £300 a year for safety tests because they invite people to view their decorations and donate to charity. Mr Lumsden said, "If I want people inside my house I would need all the electrics checked, not just the Christmas decorations. It would be every appliance, even down to the kettle."
There will also be no new lighting displays in Helston this year after the cost of complying with legislation. The town's Christmas lights committee chairman, Robert Williams, commented, "It is now law that all fixing eyes and hooks that we use to suspend the lights from are stress-tested to withstand a minimum loading." The committee is appealing for donations after stringent health and safety testing, which cost approximately £4,000, rendered its lights fund near zero.
Conversely, residents in Coleford complained that their Christmas display has been put up too soon... in October. Volunteers began decorating the town early because they feared health and safety regulations would prevent them from finishing before Christmas. Bryan Marrot, who helped put up the lights explained, "We need safety contracts and insurance to cover working on the ladders and using cherry-picker cranes. Then doing all the safety checks takes a lot of time, so we start as early as possible."
Further, fears over breaching health and safety rules have led to a ban on putting up Christmas trees. Llandovery council has forbidden the use of stepladders to put up decorations above shops and businesses. Deputy mayor Helene Lovell said, "We have been advised that over a certain height we need scaffolding or a cherry-picker. We are only a small council and we cannot afford the extra costs." Dave Worthington, who had been contracted to put up trees, said, "I think its probably a triumph of bureaucracy over common sense."
However, the Health and Safety Executive, who perennially hear of workers being banned from putting up decorations for health and safety reasons, advise that most organisations manage to put them up without a fuss. They just sensibly provide their staff with suitable step ladders rather than expecting them to balance on chairs.
