Falling through the cracks

Automatic gates
After three children were killed by automatic gates on estates, Gate Safe was set up to improve safety. The problem is that legislation changes on installation, and so does liability

Words Jan Carlos Kucharek

The deaths of two children in 2010 within a week of each other in Manchester and Bridgend as a result of becoming trapped in automatic gates at the entrances to estates, drew the attention of the construction industry to lapses in both the guidance and regulation of the design and specification of automated gate systems. That same year also made the industry acutely aware of the possible scale of liability. The 2006 death of 9-year-old Jason Kent in Poole, Dorset – when his head was crushed between a gate hinge mechanism and its gate post – saw the gate installer, Faulkner Gates Ltd, fined £80,000 for breaches under Section 3 (1) of the Health and Safety at Work Act. But with the general prevalence to increase security on private residential developments, questions remain about whether guidance is robust enough to ensure that similar tragedies don’t occur again.

Unusually, the ‘Gate Safe’ campaign, which aims to close policy loopholes, is an industry, rather than government, driven initiative. It was started by an appalled Richard Jackson, the MD of supplier and installer Jacksons Fencing, in the September following the two deaths. This month Jacksons hosts the 2012 summit, bringing the trade together with industry experts and safety organisations to see if and where regulation needs to be further tightened. 

Jackson remains more committed to stricter regulation than ever, saying that those specifying and installing gates are ‘in possession of a shotgun without a licence’. As the 2010 ruling proves, it is the installer that takes on ultimate liability, but while they ‘take the flack for negligence, that doesn’t preclude the architect or contractor being as liable for the bad specification of the item in the first place,’ says Jackson. In this regard, he thinks it’s a supply chain issue, where collective ignorance leads to bad specification and the fitting of unsuitable installations. And with HSE policy being ‘retroactive’ and ‘only kicking-in once there’s been an accident’, it’s the industry that needs to be at the vanguard.

‘On the face of it gate automation doesn’t seem that complex, but that’s the problem’ says Jackson, ‘There isn’t really any specific BS guidance. The HSE has been trying to use force testing equipment, which claims that any force shouldn’t be more than 500kN at the leading edge, but that doesn’t take account of the forces imposed at other parts of the gate.’ As a result, he has tried to compile draft guidance with the Door and Hardware Federation.

As things stand, the main guidance that specifiers and installers should refer to is BS EN 12635: 2002 ( Industrial, commercial and garage doors and gates – Installation and Use) and BS EN 12453: 2001 (Industrial, commercial and garage doors and gates – Safety in use of power operated doors). And this is the nub of the issue, according to the DHF. ‘The problem is that the standards were really only concerned with industrial doors, and gates just ended up included in the scope by default,’ says Michael Skelding, vice president of the federation. ‘It was just treated as another form of industrial door, which is simply inadequate for their recent application as private residential access gating.’ But, he explains, it’s also complicated by the fact that automated gate mechanisms are subject to different EU regulations once they are fitted.

‘The closing mechanism itself just needs to comply with the Construction Products Directive to get a CE marking in the factory, but once fitted to a gate or door it becomes subject to the EU’s Machinery Directive,’ he explains. ‘Then the installer effectively becomes a machinery designer, and rules on the validity of factory affixed CE markings no longer apply. What’s needed is a thorough risk assessment and declaration of conformity to the Directive before a new and valid CE marking can be applied.

Unfortunately, Skelding explains, everyone in the industry seems ignorant of the subtle regulatory changes that occur from factory through to fitting. And it’s not helped by the variety of applications that architects can specify in, from industrial, to residential, to private homes, involving installers that may range from major contractors to security firms, fencing contractors to ‘white van man’ jobbing builders. With everyone delegating responsibility and very few organisations aware of their responsibilities in law, it comes as no surprise that in a 2011 survey conducted by Gate Safe, a massive 88% of the gates surveyed failed to meet HSE guidelines (see box, right). Skelding is not surprised, saying: ‘No two gates are identical – you cannot reduce regulation to a formula.’ But you can make it more user friendly, which he hopes will be proved should the HSE endorse its draft industry standards this month.

This is not before time. Leeds University’s Sarah Blandy, who has researched the sociological implications of gated communities for 10 years, says that anecdotal evidence suggests private gated communities are still on the rise. ‘This is borne out by the fact that most councils don’t have a specific policy against the gating of developments, meaning that councils will defer to Secured by Design guidance,’ she says. In its defence, Secured by Design claims its policy is merely to ensure garage areas to estates are gated to make them secure, and that good design should ensure communities themselves do not need to be gated. But this appears to contradict Blandy’s view that Secured by Design criteria can be interpreted as being generally pro-gating.

And as Gate Safe’s Richard Jackson attests, it might well be issues outside mechanism design or health and safety factors that have the biggest impact on the automated gates and their uptake. Jackson talks of insurance concerns that could finally drive gate safety to the fore. ‘I would like to see insurance assessors bringing gates into their general inspections because they would pick up the tab in the case of an accident claim. As it is they don’t see the need to do anything, which strikes me as short sighted’. When asked, the Association of British Insurers said it was ‘not an issue for them at the moment’– but in our increasingly litigious culture, we may find ambulance chasers making progress where guidance and regulation has yet to.

The Gate Safe summit 2012 is on 8 February at the RIBA

At a glance

Health and Safety Executive recommendations for type 3 automated gates (where people have access)

What you need to do if you install or modify electrically powered gates in areas that people have access to:

> All doors need to ultimately comply with the harmonised standard BS EN 13241-1

> You need the right testing equipment to measure closing/opening forces. Without this equipment, you can’t be sure that the gates meet the safety standards, in which case you should not install them. When the gates are opening or closing, the force of the gate should be limited to that specified in British/ European standards. The gates should also reverse if they hit someone or something.

> Gates should have sensors that can stop them if someone has been detected. This could be light beams (photoelectric devices), which stop the gates before they reach an obstacle. A single photocell alone cannot achieve this.

> Any parts of the gates where someone could become trapped or get crushed while they are moving need to be protected. People could get injured, for example, as the bars of the gates pass the gate post.

> The gates must have an emergency
release mechanism in case someone gets trapped.

> Any gate fitted on site should be provided with a risk assessment that is specific to the gate and its siting. Architects should be aware of the precise application of the gates and consider that children, through curiosity, are particularly drawn to such mechanisms. Architects should bear this in mind if specifying. To date, all the deaths that have occurred in gate incidents have been children.

Source: The Field Operations Directive of the Health and Safety Executive.