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UKATA Asbestos Awareness
Half a day, and the training the law expects anybody who might disturb asbestos to have had. It is not about working with asbestos. It is about recognising it and not touching it.
About this course
Asbestos still kills around five thousand people a year in Britain, more than road traffic accidents, and the people dying now were exposed decades ago by work that seemed routine at the time. Drilling a wall. Lifting a ceiling tile. Running a cable through a riser.
Regulation 10 of the Control of Asbestos Regulations 2012 requires employers to make sure anybody liable to be exposed to asbestos, and anybody supervising that work, receives suitable information, instruction and training. Asbestos awareness is how that duty is met for the enormous number of trades who might come across it without ever intending to work on it.
The course does three things. It teaches you to recognise where asbestos containing materials are likely to be, which is a far wider list than most people expect. It explains what exposure actually does, including why the risk multiplies for smokers. And it makes absolutely clear what to do when you find something suspect, which is to stop.
That last point is the whole purpose. Asbestos awareness does not qualify anybody to work with asbestos, disturb it, or remove it, and the course is emphatic about it. The training exists to stop work, not to enable it.
We run it at our centres in Stoke-on-Trent, Derby, Manchester and Liverpool, live online, and onsite nationwide. Certification is UKATA, which is what clients and principal contractors ask for by name.
- What asbestos is, the three main types, and why it was used so widely
- The properties that made it useful and the properties that make it lethal
- Asbestos related diseases: asbestosis, lung cancer, mesothelioma and pleural thickening
- Why the risk to smokers is so much higher than the risk to non smokers
- The Control of Asbestos Regulations 2012, and Regulation 10 in particular
- Where asbestos containing materials are likely to be found in buildings
- Why any building constructed or refurbished before 2000 has to be assumed suspect
- Reading an asbestos register and a refurbishment and demolition survey
- Recognising damaged or deteriorating asbestos containing materials
- What to do if you find or disturb something suspect: stop, prevent access, report
- Emergency procedures following an accidental disturbance
How completing this course helps you
- A UKATA asbestos awareness certificate, valid for one year
- Trades who stop rather than carry on when something looks suspect
- Evidence that your Regulation 10 information, instruction and training duty has been met
- The certificate principal contractors and clients ask for by name at induction
Who should attend?
Anybody whose work could disturb asbestos containing materials: electricians, plumbers, gas engineers, joiners, plasterers, painters and decorators, roofers, shopfitters, telecoms and data engineers, demolition workers, surveyors, caretakers and general maintenance teams, and the supervisors and managers responsible for them.
Entry requirements. None. No previous asbestos training is needed.
Ready to take the next step?
Choose a delivery option, compare dates and book with confidence, or ask MB and get an answer straight away.
Awareness is a stop sign
Asbestos awareness does not let you touch it
This is the point the course drives hardest. Asbestos awareness training gives you the knowledge to recognise asbestos containing materials and avoid disturbing them. It does not qualify anybody to work on them, drill them, remove them or clean up after them.
If your people actually carry out non licensed work with asbestos containing materials, for example removing asbestos cement sheeting or working on textured coatings, they need the Non Licensed Operative course instead, and there is a separate route again for licensed work.
If you are the person responsible for a non domestic building rather than the person working in it, Regulation 4 puts a duty on you personally and the Duty to Manage course is the one that covers it.
Might come across it
Asbestos Awareness. Half a day, annually, for every trade that opens up a building.
Working in soils and made ground
Asbestos Awareness for Groundworkers, which covers asbestos in the ground rather than in buildings.
Actually working on ACMs
Non Licensed Operative training, which is a different course with a different purpose.
Responsible for the building
Duty to Manage Asbestos, covering Regulation 4.
Course content
What you will cover
Asbestos and health
- What asbestos is and the three main types
- Why it was used and where it went
- Asbestos related diseases and their latency
- The multiplying effect of smoking
- Who is being exposed today, and how
Finding it before you disturb it
- The Control of Asbestos Regulations 2012 and Regulation 10
- Duty to manage, and the asbestos register
- Management surveys and refurbishment and demolition surveys
- Common locations of asbestos containing materials
- Buildings built or refurbished before 2000
- Recognising damage and deterioration
What to do about it
- Stopping work and preventing access
- Who to report to and what to record
- Emergency procedures after an accidental disturbance
- Decontamination in outline
- What asbestos awareness does not authorise you to do
Method of assessment
How Asbestos Awareness is assessed
Assessment runs through the session, with a short written check to close. Certification is issued through UKATA.
Discussion and recognition
Working through photographs and material samples of the places asbestos turns up, including several that surprise people every time.
Written check
A short paper covering the health effects, the common locations and the actions to take on discovery.
UKATA certificate
Issued on successful completion and valid for one year. Refresher training is expected annually.
Ways to learn
How you can take this course
Every route covers the same accredited syllabus and the same support. Pick the one that fits how your people work.
Live online
The same tutor and the same timetable, joined from anywhere.
Ask us to open a live online date →or ask MB nowDates and locations
Pick a date
Live availability from our booking system. Prices exclude VAT.
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Can't see a date that works? Request one - we add dates most weeks.
Also available
In-company training
We run this one to order, at your place or ours.
Onsite / in-company
Run Asbestos Awareness at your site
We deliver anywhere in the UK, on your dates and around your shift patterns. For six or more people it is usually cheaper per head than sending everyone to a centre, and nobody loses a day travelling.
Tell us roughly how many people and when, and we will come back with options and a price, or ask MB and get an answer straight away.
What onsite includes
- The same tutor, materials and certification as our centres
- Your venue or one we arrange near you
- Dates and start times built around your operation
- One invoice and one point of contact for the whole group
- Content examples drawn from your own workplace
Asbestos Awareness FAQs
Regulation 10 of the Control of Asbestos Regulations 2012 requires employers to ensure that anybody liable to be exposed to asbestos, and anybody supervising them, receives suitable information, instruction and training. No specific course is named, but UKATA asbestos awareness is the recognised way employers meet and evidence that duty.
One year. Asbestos is one of the few subjects where annual refresher training is genuinely the expectation, and most principal contractors will check the date at induction.
No, and this is the most important thing on the course. Awareness training exists so you recognise asbestos and stop. Carrying out non licensed work with asbestos containing materials requires the Non Licensed Operative course, and licensed work requires a licensed contractor.
Any building constructed or refurbished before the year 2000 should be treated as containing asbestos until a survey says otherwise. That covers a very large share of the UK building stock, which is why so many trades need this training.
Yes. We deliver it live online as well as in the classroom and onsite, and the UKATA certificate is the same.
Annually. The Control of Asbestos Regulations 2012 require training to be refreshed at regular intervals, and UKATA and HSE guidance both point at twelve months for asbestos awareness and non licensed work. It is one of the few subjects where an annual refresher is genuinely the expectation rather than a nicety.
Yes. Acadame is a UKATA member and this training is delivered to the UKATA standard, so the certificate is the one a principal contractor or client is looking for when they ask for UKATA asbestos training.
Yes, anywhere in the UK, and it works well for a whole team. We can also run it live online where that suits a spread out workforce better.
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