Health and safety code aims to advise over asbestos

Inhaling asbestos fibres can lead to serious diseases like lung cancer

Guernsey's Health and Safety Executive is asking for help from the building industry to ensure asbestos is properly dealt with in the future.

The call follows an increased number of failures to deal with asbestos.

The executive has proposed a draft code of practice for consultation with the industry and other stakeholders.

Inhaling asbestos fibres can lead to serious diseases such as lung cancer. It was widely used as a building material from the 1950s to the mid-80s.

The executive warned asbestos could be found in any building or structure built before 2000.

It hopes the approved code of practice will provide useful guidance to everyone involved in handling asbestos and help reduce the number of cases where there have been failures to manage it correctly.

In November a day centre at the Castel Hospital had to be closed when asbestos was found after part of the roof collapsed following heavy rain.