Children and Health and Safety, positive foundations........

Children and Health and Safety, positive foundations……

The growth of Health and Safety is ad course wide spread, integrated throughout everything we do. Look around you and you will be hard stretched to see something not affected by Health and Safety legislation. This is ad course a positive, a healthy balance of safety, safe working environments and duty of care for each others safety, reduces our risk of injury or death.  But we should ponder if, and how we can stop this being detrimental for future generations.

Those of you who know me, know that I like adventure sports, like kayaking, climbing, mountaineering and bouldering. All of which put the “duty of care” upon myself. When I travel outdoors, I don’t have supervisors and paper risk assessments.

WAIT ! I hear you shout…….. but how do you stay safe ????

Well its quite easy actually. Firstly taking proper equipment for kayaking like first aid kit, throw line, knife and buoyancy aid, warm clothes and checking the weather. Once out on the water its important to assess dangers. When climbing we all check each other’s knots, harnesses and equipment. In bouldering you learn how to fall of the wall safely, whilst being aware of other climbers around the centre. Most importantly we realise that there’s more to life than putting in a claim all the time. Its actually rather good fun to fall of a wall, then laugh with other climbers who saw you loose a fight with gravity.

But I do wonder, with children swapping real adventures for virtual worlds, conker games requiring safety gear, and the overall bubble wrapping of children. How will they learn to assess dangers ? Will the next generations of teenagers know how to care for themselves, assessing dangers and reducing risks ? Will they never take chances, in the off chance of injury ? I tend to think we should get children doing sports that encourage a sense of duty of care. Lets get children climbing/kayaking/climbing mountains, taking a responsibility for their own safety. Adults should step back, supervise, but let children make decisions.