RAMS stands for Risk Assessment and Method Statement, the paired documents that describe how a construction task will be carried out safely. The risk assessment identifies hazards and the controls that reduce them; the method statement sets out the step-by-step sequence of the work.
Contractors prepare RAMS for their activities and principal contractors review them before work starts. They are briefed to the workforce, commonly through toolbox talks, and form part of the evidence that duties under the Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2015 are being met.
RAMS are living documents: when conditions or methods change, the RAMS should change with them, and the record of what was briefed to whom becomes important if an incident is ever investigated.