Site Welfare Facilities: What CDM 2015 Schedule 2 Actually Requires

Pro Site Docs · Guide

Welfare is the part of CDM that inspectors can check in thirty seconds, and it is the part small contractors most often get wrong - not because it is complicated, but because the facilities arrive a week after the people do.

Who has to provide it

CDM 2015 regulation 13(4) requires the principal contractor to ensure suitable welfare facilities are provided throughout the construction phase. Regulation 15(11) puts the same duty on every contractor for their own workers. And regulation 4 requires the client to make sure welfare is in place before construction starts. So three parties share the duty, and the practical answer for a subcontractor is: check what the principal contractor is providing, confirm it in writing, and provide your own if it is not there. 'The main contractor never sorted it' is not a defence.

What Schedule 2 lists

• Sanitary conveniences - enough toilets, ventilated, lit, kept clean, with separate facilities for men and women or lockable single rooms
• Washing facilities - including showers where the work requires them, with hot and cold (or warm) running water, soap and a means of drying, next to the toilets and the changing area
• Drinking water - readily accessible, marked, with cups unless it is a fountain
• Changing rooms and lockers - where special clothing is worn and workers cannot reasonably change elsewhere, with secure storage for their own clothes
• Rest facilities - somewhere to sit with tables and chairs, a means of boiling water and preparing food, and arrangements to protect non-smokers
• Everything adequately heated, lit, ventilated and maintained

From day one, not week two

The regulations say 'throughout the construction phase'. That includes the first day of site set-up, the fencing crew, the person doing the ground investigation. A welfare unit that is 'on order' is not welfare. HSE's construction inspection campaigns return to this every year for a reason: it is the single most common material breach on small sites, and it is the easiest one to prove.

How many toilets

CDM does not give a number. The commonly used guide, taken from the Workplace Regulations approved code of practice and HSE construction guidance, is roughly one toilet and one washbasin per five to fifteen people depending on the arrangement, rising with headcount. For a short-duration or transient job HSE accepts that portable facilities and arrangements with nearby premises can be adequate - but 'adequate' still has to be planned and written down, not assumed.

What to record

The welfare arrangements go in the construction phase plan. On the ground, keep a simple welfare inspection record: units checked, cleaned, water topped up, heating working, dated and signed. It is the document that turns 'we had welfare' into evidence.

Get the documents ready-made

Our Welfare & Site Setup Pack covers welfare arrangements, inspection records and site set-up checklists, or take individual site set-up templates.

General guidance only. This article explains how the rules generally work in UK construction. It is not advice for your specific site, task or project, and it is not legal advice. Your own risk assessment, method statement and arrangements must be prepared and checked by a competent person for the actual work being done.