PROPOSED ELECTRICAL LEGISLATION

I am surprised to see that any "competent Inspector" requires a guidance note as to the code for deviations from BS7671. If you are competent you know what is dangerous, could become dangerous, or simply would be best improved! If you don't know that you are NBG immediately! You also need to know all the regulations properly, and can find the relevant bits in the book if needed, and can read properly. The 18th exam makes some attempt at this but probably anything less than 90% should get a code 1 on the Inspector, and that is most people who passed! The number of passes at 90% or more is quite small, and 60% is useless for inspection, it says you will miss 40% of defects. So great improvement is needed by many people, and the Electrical Safety First book or whatever is not the way to get improvement, it is to make it possible for inadequate inspectors to carry out domestic inspections of fairly dubious quality.


When one sees many of the items on EICRs and the codes given, it seems that the last thing of interest is the danger, it is the possible money to be made! Take a comment above, "all the plastic CUs need to be changed". Really, and why? If all the terminals are checked and the tails secured, why is it even potentially dangerous? If we are not careful the legislators will make the words in the book more important than the intent for safe installations, probably because they simply don't understand what is safe or what safe means. It is a hugely overused term, everything on earth now seems to say something about this is safer than before. How do you know, the only way to tell is experience, and that is what is missing from these regulations. I assume that the Government discussions with Industry did not include the IET, and was probably only NICEIC. Their vested interest in their members is obvious to keep the status quo, yet the most effective change would be to make the Inspection and reparation stages entirely separate, in that they CANNOT be the same contractor, and an Inspecting contractor is separately assessed every year. This is the normal way with inspection in most safety critical industries, and it does work very reliably, from experience.

I am surprised to see that any "competent Inspector" requires a guidance note as to the code for deviations from BS7671. If you are competent you know what is dangerous, could become dangerous, or simply would be best improved! If you don't know that you are NBG immediately! You also need to know all the regulations properly, and can find the relevant bits in the book if needed, and can read properly. The 18th exam makes some attempt at this but probably anything less than 90% should get a code 1 on the Inspector, and that is most people who passed! The number of passes at 90% or more is quite small, and 60% is useless for inspection, it says you will miss 40% of defects. So great improvement is needed by many people, and the Electrical Safety First book or whatever is not the way to get improvement, it is to make it possible for inadequate inspectors to carry out domestic inspections of fairly dubious quality.


When one sees many of the items on EICRs and the codes given, it seems that the last thing of interest is the danger, it is the possible money to be made! Take a comment above, "all the plastic CUs need to be changed". Really, and why? If all the terminals are checked and the tails secured, why is it even potentially dangerous? If we are not careful the legislators will make the words in the book more important than the intent for safe installations, probably because they simply don't understand what is safe or what safe means. It is a hugely overused term, everything on earth now seems to say something about this is safer than before. How do you know, the only way to tell is experience, and that is what is missing from these regulations. I assume that the Government discussions with Industry did not include the IET, and was probably only NICEIC. Their vested interest in their members is obvious to keep the status quo, yet the most effective change would be to make the Inspection and reparation stages entirely separate, in that they CANNOT be the same contractor, and an Inspecting contractor is separately assessed every year. This is the normal way with inspection in most safety critical industries, and it does work very reliably, from experience.