Think about your place of worship – you may find there is more manual handling going on than you first realise. Some organisations have a constant manoeuvring of furniture, platforms, pianos etc to cater for differing needs. Can any of this be avoided, or made safer?
You must carry out an assessment of all manual handing operations, and reduce manual handling wherever possible. If moving items by hand cannot be avoided then you should provide training and mechanical assistance (e.g. trolleys) wherever possible.
For further guidance you can download the HSE’s ‘Short guide to manual handling’
http://www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/indg143.pdf (12 pages)
For a toolkit for assessing tasks (other than pushing and pulling) the HSE’s guide to ‘manual handling assessment charts (MAC)’ can be downloaded here
http://www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/indg383.pdf (16 pages)
