Hampshire County Council

Buildings, Land and Procurement Panel Item

5 April 2005

The Management of Legionella - Annual Review

Report by the Director of Property, Business and Regulatory Services

How the conclusion in this report fits with the Corporate Strategy

This scheme will impact on the delivery of the following Corporate Aims

Aim 2 - stewardship of the environment - by managing and controlling legionella in the built estate

1

Summary

1.1

The County Council has a duty under the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974, to consider the risks from legionella that may affect people, including staff, services users, volunteers, contractors and members of the public.

1.2

The Control of Substances Hazardous to Health (COSHH) Regulations 2002 require building owners and occupiers to assess the risk to building users from Legionella and take suitable precautions.

1.3

This report clarifies the arrangements that are in place to manage and control legionella within County Council buildings and to meet best practice guidelines in the Approved Code of Practice Guidance L8.

1.4

The key objectives of this workstream are to minimise the risk of exposure to legionella bacteria and to ensure that the County Council adopts best practice procedures at the level of L8. The current prosecution of a Council and a senior manager in Cumbria illustrates both the important nature of this subject and the requirement to maintain the highest levels of performance and practice.

2

Best Practice Guidelines

2.1

The guidelines for the control of Legionella are included in the the Health and Safety Commission document entitled "Legionnaires disease - The control of Legionella bacteria in water systems - Approved Code of Practice and Guidance L8" - more commonly referred to as L8.

2.2

L8 recommends for each building where there may be the risk of legionella that:

a) the Duty Holder completes an assessment (or has this done on their behalf) to determine whether there is a risk of exposure to legionella in the building;

b) where such a risk is deemed to exist, the Duty Holder shall appoint a Responsible Person(s) to properly manage that risk so as to minimise the risk to the building users;

c) the Responsible Person(s) are to set down a written scheme of work designed to minimise the risk and shall ensure those persons who are to follow the written scheme are properly trained to do so;

d) records are to be kept of the regime arising from the written scheme of work.

2.3

The policy of the County Council is to eliminate, where possible, the sources of legionella, but where this is not practical to limit the risk of exposure to the bacteria by ensuring the correct management of the risk.

2.4

As reported to the Panel on 19 October 2004, detection of legionella is currently ranked seventh in the Property Services Strategic Risk Register for 2004/5 with a green performance rating.

3

Definitions

3.1

For the purposes of L8, the Duty Holder is normally the owner of the building or that person who has the Landlord function. In respect of the County Council this is the Director of Property, Business and Regulatory Services (PBRS).

3.2

In most circumstances there are two Responsible Persons, one representing the Landlord (ie PBRS) and one the building user. The building user's nominated Responsible Person will typically be the Head Teacher in the case of a school, a Service Manger or Building Manager. It is this named person who is responsible for ensuring the written scheme is adhered to and full and proper records are kept of the execution of the written scheme.

3.3

The Written Scheme will detail all of the tasks that need to be undertaken, by whom and their frequency in order to comply with the recommendations of L8. It also details what records are to be kept, their form and for what duration.

4

The Strategy for Minimising the Risk of Exposure to Legionella

4.1

With an estate comprising several thousands of buildings, most of which have water services of some description, it would not be feasible to undertake Legionella risk assessments of all of the building stock simultaneously.

4.2

In order that resources are targeted at the highest risk sectors, the buildings in the Council's Estate have been assessed and categorised to enable those presenting the highest risk from Legionella to be addressed first. The assessment was made based on the following factors:

· plant where there was a risk of disseminating aerosol droplets over a wide geographical area, eg cooling towers

· buildings where there were vulnerable people, eg the elderly and infirm or those with respiratory conditions.

4.3

Using these criteria the order of risk was established for generic building types and three groups were established - High Risk, Medium Risk and Low Risk. The table below represents the types of building and their generic risk classification:

High Risk

Buildings with Cooling Towers

Older Persons Residential Homes

Day Centres ( all types)

Special Schools

Medium Risk

Children's Homes

Family Centres

Early Years and Pre-school groups

Outdoor Activity Centres

Sports Centres & Pools

Offices with Shower Facilities

Low Risk

Secondary Schools

Primary Schools

Youth Centres

Libraries

Community Centres & Village Halls

Museums & Art Centres

Magistrates & other Courts

Farms

Office Accommodation

Highway & Transport Depots

Private Dwelling eg Caretakers houses

5

Managing the Risk

5.1

Management of the risk is driven by the categorisation above. This acknowledges that, whilst the vast majority of the people using schools, libraries, museums and offices are not a high risk group of the population, there are a significant number who, because of their age or state of health, are more susceptible to the risk due to the exposure of Legionella bacteria.

Recognising this, the County Council has concentrated its resources on addressing the issues in the High Risk category.

5.2

5.2.1

Domestic Water Systems

It is not possible to eliminate totally the risk due to the Legionella bacteria, and it is therefore vital that the management regime is clearly documented and properly carried out.

5.2.2

Key to this in domestic water systems is regular flushing and it is important that the building users are properly trained and instructed in this task.

`Facilities Managers' are currently being identified for each building. Their responsibilities will be to undertake key tasks, including the management of the Legionella control regimes. These `Facilities Managers are the named Responsible Persons in the context of L8.

5.2.3

In addition, the Term Engineering Maintenance Contractors carry out regular servicing and maintenance of plant and equipment including the inspection of water storage tanks and hot water calorifiers.

5.3

5.3.1

Cooling Towers

It is possible to eliminate the risk from cooling towers by replacing the `wet' towers with `dry coolers' which do not rely on the evaporation of water to reject waste heat.

5.3.2

The Buildings, Land and Procurement Panel previously agreed to the replacement of the three remaining `wet' towers, subject to technical reviews. Two of the replacement schemes (Three Minsters House, Winchester and the Laboratory, Southsea) were to be funded through Policy and Resources Capital Repairs. The system at the Winchester Law Courts was to be funded by the Department for Constitutional Affairs.

5.3.3

Currently only the replacement of the tower in Three Minsters House will proceed. The proposed works outlined for the Hampshire Scientific Services building in Southsea is on hold whilst the long term future of the building is decided. To date, funding has not been made available from the DCA to fund the Winchester Law Courts tower replacement and this scheme too is held in abeyance.

5.3.4

In view of this, these `wet' towers will be recommissioned and run for a further season with robust management regimes in place to ensure they operate in line with the Best Practice Guidance set down in L8.

6

Testing for the Presence of Legionella

6.1

There is no legal requirement for the Legionella testing to be undertaken, but recognising the vulnerability of the residents in our care homes, Hampshire Scientific Services undertake regular testing of the water in the domestic hot and cold water systems in each of the 26 homes. Hampshire Scientific Services also monitor the condition of the water in the three cooling towers operated by Property Services to ensure the water treatment regimes are effective.

6.2

The test results for the residential care homes shows that the majority of the homes in the county have no detectable Legionella in their water systems. Unfortunately, there are a number where Legionella bacteria are detected. These currently number 9 in total, but analysis of the figures shows a steady decline in both the numbers of locations in each home (where there has been a detection) and of the level of bacteria detected in the samples.

6.3

The reduction is the result of the work undertaken to improve the operation of the plant and equipment as well as a more rigorous flushing regime operated by the building users.

6.4

Testing of the cooling tower water has shown that, with the exception of a single low level detection in one of the towers in September 2004, all of the samples have proved negative for the presence of Legionella bacteria for a number of years.

7

Financial Issues

7.1

The revenue cost of maintenance and repairs is estimated to be £150,000, excluding staff time. Most of this is funded by Policy and Resources with a contribution from Social Services. The capital costs are borne by Policy and Resources and the estimated costs in 2005/6 are around £250,000.

8

Future Proposals

8.1

In line with the best practices set out in L8, the Director of PBRS will continue to roll out a programme of surveys, risk assessments, remedial works and awareness training across all of the medium and low risk properties working alongside the Client departments to ensure an integrated approach is adopted for the management of Legionella. This should ensure:

· all properties have a current risk assessment in place

· Responsible Persons are nominated for each property

· any remedial engineering work is identified and corrected

· the flushing and management regimes are carried out fully and properly recorded.

Recommendations

That the Buildings, Land and Procurement Panel advises the Executive Member for Policy and Resources that approval be given to:

1

The improvements in the test results in the residential care homes as identified in the report be endorsed.

2

Continuing to improve the quality of the management of Legionella in line with the best practices outlined in L8.

3

The Director of Property, Business and Regulatory Services reminding Chief Officers of the appropriate regulations and best practice to be delivered by local building managers.