When there is poor risk assessment management at a corporate and local level, poor communication and poor supervision
What happened?
A 5 year-old boy was attending a holiday activity club at David Lloyd Leisure Club in Heston. At registration, his mother explained that her son could not swim but was confident in the water wearing armbands.
Staff working on the day of registration were informed that the boy could not swim in a registration form completed by his mother. She was not aware that the club did not have armbands.
The information about the boy being a non-swimmer was not passed to the activities co-ordinator. When he attended the pool the next day, the staff were not aware that he could not swim. They issued him with a pool noodle (woggle) as his only floatation device. His standing height was less than the 1.2m shallow end. They failed to supervise him for most of his time in the pool, and there was no physical support from a staff member in the pool.
CCTV showed the boy hanging onto, and then moving away from, the wall without his noodle, before being unable to support himself in the water. He lay in the water unconscious for over five minutes before he was spotted by another child who asked the lifeguard to tell the boy to stop ‘bobbing up and down’ in the pool. He was pulled from the water by the lifeguard and CPR was begun by centre staff and later paramedics. He was taken to hospital where he made a full recovery.
David Lloyd’s risk assessment stated: ‘non-swimmers are not allowed to attend splash sessions, and armbands should be provided for inexperienced swimmers regardless of age’. That risk assessment was amended by the club a year before the incident, and parents must provide armbands for inexperienced swimmers rather than the club. The prohibition on non-swimmers attending splash sessions was also removed.
Legal Outcome
David Lloyd Leisure pleaded guilty to a single breach of s.3(1) HSWA 1974. They were fined £330,000 and ordered to pay £22,131.75 in costs plus a victim surcharge of £120. The family had already settled a personal injury claim as part of an out of court settlement.
What can we learn from what happened?
Thankfully, a near miss, but could so easily have been a fatality.
David Lloyd accepted that their policy on amending risk assessments had been complied with by the club, and that it was a deficient amendment policy which was to blame not the actions of the club individual.
So, this happened because of poor risk assessment management at a corporate level, poor risk assessment decisions at a local level, and poor communication and supervision at the time. The poor communication and supervision may have been the immediate cause, but as is so often the case, the organisational failure was the root cause.
Nevertheless, David Lloyd felt the need to confirm that the team members supervising the session are no longer with the business. It is not known whether the team members responsible for corporate risk assessment still are.
Source of Information
Water Incident Research Hub