thereby pulling down on the eye 44 on the base of the grounding clamp pulling down on eye 44 also pulls down ring 50 onto the spring 46 which releases the teeth 52 on ring 50 in the locking mechanism the bearing 56 allows the hot stick to be twisted in direction d while under tension from the compressed spring 46 as will be appreciated by one skilled in the art various other mechanisms may be employed to actuate a lock out locking mechanism disabling the grounding clamp so that the lock out will lock the operation of the clamp unless in the presence of an insulating tool such as a hot stick for example the lockout does not necessarily have to employ mating sets of teeth as other braking mechanisms including those relying on friction or adhesion between mating components may also work further the spring and magnet arrangement in the lock out described above may be reversed also the proximity or presence of the hot stick so as to unlock the lock out may be detected by the lock out other than by the use of a magnetic field and operate other than by a magnet field overcoming a resilient biasing of one locking component against another for example the mating of the hot stick with the clamp may mechanically disengage a spring loaded latch mechanism wherein for example a pushing of the hot stick against a plunger within a coupling housing on the clamp will disengage the latch mechanism in the lock out as will be apparent to those skilled in the art in the light of.