Safety Alert: Ropes Attached to Children's Slides
The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) remind us of the dangers of ropes being attached to children’s slides, and the potential for children to be caught by this rope and potentially strangled.
The Council’s Health, Safety and Wellbeing team were recently contacted by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) about children’s play equipment.
The HSE wanted to remind us of the dangers of ropes being attached to children’s slides, and the potential for children to be caught by this rope and potentially strangled.
Indeed, this happened at a college nursey in York, and a young girl died as a result.
Subsequently, York College was found guilty of breaching the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 and received a substantial fine. Accident (York College Nursery)
The HSE have advised that if you have ropes attached to children slides (which pupils use to pull themselves up the slide slope), that you remove these ropes or shorten them, so that such an incident is not possible. Their preference is the former.
Our team recognises that Play is great for children’s well-being and development. When planning and providing play opportunities, the goal is not to eliminate risk, but to weigh up the risks and benefits.
In this case we feel the risk outweighs any benefit, therefore we recommend that you check any children’s slides on your premises and if present, you simply remove any ropes from the slide.