The point
Around 5,000 people die every year from asbestos-related disease. Not from the old days - every year, now. It kills slowly. You breathe in the fibres today, and the disease turns up decades later, when nothing can be done about it. This five minutes is so you know when to stop and shout up. It is not asbestos training. If a job needs that, you do the course first - no course, no job.
The hazard, in plain terms
Asbestos was banned in 1999. So any building put up, or done up, before 2000 can have it in. Newer buildings are unlikely to have it. Older ones - assume they might.
It hides in ordinary-looking stuff. Ceiling tiles. Partition boards. Fire doors. Textured coatings like Artex. Floor tiles under old carpets. Lagging on pipes and boilers. Cement roofs and gutters. Sprayed coatings on steel. Loose fill in lofts and cavity walls.
And here is the catch: you cannot tell by looking. A board with asbestos in it looks the same as one without. The fibres are too small to see. You cannot smell them. You cannot feel them - not in the air, not on your clothes.
Left alone and in good nick, it is very low risk. The danger starts when someone drills it, cuts it, breaks it or rips it out. That is when the fibres get into the air, and into whoever is stood there.
What to do
- Before you start, ask how old the building is. Built or done up before 2000 - assume asbestos could be in it.
- Ask to see the asbestos survey or register before you drill, cut or strip anything.
- Not sure what a material is? Treat it as asbestos until someone proves otherwise.
- Find something suspect, or crack something you cannot vouch for? Stop work straight away.
- Keep everyone away from it.
- Come and tell me at once. That is the whole job - stop, keep clear, report.
What to never do
- Never carry on "just to get finished". Stopping costs an hour. Fibres cost lives.
- Never drill, cut, break or sand a material you cannot vouch for.
- Never sweep up suspect dust or debris. Sweeping throws the fibres straight into the air.
- Never try to remove it or clean it up yourself. That is specialist work for trained, licensed people - not us, not today.
Questions to ask the crowd
The talk ends in a conversation. These are the ones that start it.
- Where on this job might asbestos be hiding, and what would you check before you put a drill in?
- You lift an old carpet and the tiles under it break up. Talk me through what you do, step by step.
- Why can we not just look at a board and call it safe?
A toolbox talk is a refresher and a conversation. It is not formal training, and it does not by itself make you or your site compliant.