Well it sounds like he suspects the tenant to bodge it in somewhere, so maybe a chance he may be going into the Live head fitting a fuse with a deliberate fault on it, with no PPE unaware it will blow in his face, yeah maybe he should not be doing it, but would you be happy, potentially maiming him for life.
I suppose the most important think to say is that I personally would almost certainly not do what is being discussed. As I said/implied, I would probably use a 'Henley' (or similar), with a seal. That would obviously be no impediment to someone (with wire-cutters or scissors) determined to do things with the cable, but provided I had documented what I had done (e.g. by photograph, probably with a warning label on the Henley, also photographed) I reckon that would fairly well establish that I had 'taken reasonable steps' to prevent 'interference' with the cable.
I am no lawyer but i would think if someone was injured then there would be questions asked.
I'm no lawyer, either, but I imagine that 'questions would probably be asked' (in the event of an injury) even if, in the situation that has been described, one did what I've just suggested, even without any 'deliberate fault'....
[ Do we
really believe that this customer would be likely to 'work live' to temporarily connect this cable to a source of power. If not, then, as I originally said, there would be no real danger created by a 'deliberate short'. ]
... Working live, itself, is dangerous enough (for the 'untrained') in the absence of a 'deliberate short'. If one
really did suspect that the customer in question was likely (or even very slightly likely) to work live to connect the cable (which he had been told not to energise), I do not think that one could/should do what the OP has done without risking 'questions' if anything went wrong - since to leave a cable (even if 'locked off' in a Henley/whatever) in proximity to a potential source of electricity would be very tempting to someone who wanted to energise it (possibly by working live) - so the electrician could still be criticised for creating that temptation (in someone suspected of being capable of working live), and facilitating such craziness!
If the cable is new but the installation unsafe then leave the load end safely isolated, if someone else reconnects either end then it becomes there problem surely.
Dunno. In that situation I would certainly want to 'isolate' both ends of the cable (in Henley's with seals, or whatever). However, a person who I suspected was capable of working live in order to connect the upstream end of the cable would presumably be more than capable of also connecting the downstream end - so I suppose the electrician could again be criticised for 'facilitating' any stupidity that took place.
So, I suppose what I'm saying is that if one
really suspected that the customer was capable/likely of doing the sort of things that have been suggested, I don't think the electrician should do anything to facilitate it - for example, in the case in question, should
not install the distribution cable until everything at both ends was ready for 'immediate termination' of the cable as soon as it was installed.
However, I do wonder how likely it is that, having been 'warned', the customer really would do what people seem to be fearing.
Kind Regards, John