Health and safety
We previously invited general comments on Health and Safety regulations. To make things simpler, the regulations have been divided into four themes, and this page is now closed for comment. All comments received below will be considered as part as the Health and Safety challenge process.
To comment, click here, or click on one of the four themes below.
The health & safety regulations are essential for maintaining safe working condition for employees and the general public. Any culling of these regs will lead to more accidents & deaths.
The cuts in spending on the HSE need to be reversed as this is the body that inspects negligent & ignorant employers. Without the possibilty of a snap inspection, unscrupulous employers will take chances with health & safety and undercut employers who respect the law.
I call for no relaxing or cutting of health & safety legislation and for the restitution
of the funding to the HSE.
The confined space regulations are very much misunderstood by bodies who should understand the law. Many large contractors, public sector and government bodies do not understand what a ‘confined space’ or ‘specified risks are’ under the regs and impose unsuitable and irrelevant controls.
I am not sure that any meaningful changes can be made whilst we have a compensation culture. Companies are forced to go overboard with all things health & safety, mainly paperwork, in an attempt to protect themselves from possible lawsuits. Accidents happen in the real world, writing down details chapter and verse does little to prevent an accident. Too much writting and no one reads it. Better training, supervision simple dialogue and people being fully responsible for their own actions and taking full consequences for them is the way forward. It appears to me that when an accident occurs, a witch hunt often ensues trying to blame everyone else rather than (in many circumstances) the individual who short cuts the rules?
If this government is serious about health & safety they need to commit a serious budget for enforcement. I see many companies ignoring basic safety because they know that they will never get a snap inspection. I am in construction and despite all the paperwork and method statements etc we are required to do, accidents on site continue to rise. It clearly doesnt work at present. Too much importance is placed on companies shouldering all the responsiblity rather than individuals being responsible.
I am in agreement; I do not feel that massive changes could be made in this current ‘compensation culture’ but I do feel some areas of legislation could be simplified. Construction is a massive field where health and safety is critical. This being the industry I work within and it can be at times a struggle to communicate some complex information to those who just want to crack on and get the job done and don’t take too kindly to strict health and safety rules, as discussions in the past have surfaced comments that its an added process to their job meaning it takes longer and they can’t spend as much time doing the job they are paid for. Inevitably I will argue the point that health and safety is a part of the task in hand but it’s all about perception.
Fortunately I now work with a small team who are very responsive to the information I communicate but previous experience has been somewhat of a challenge.
I say just simplify where possible to make it easier to be communicated, understood and then put into practice.
I also feel by doing this it will make employers more inclined to follow all regulations and not cut corners or pass the blame due to the uncertainty of the implications following an accident.
Less Fluff and repetition and more focus on WHAT is actually important. Why do we have to have a huge amount of extra publications telling us how to comply to each and every regulation. The regs to cover many topics lack real direction and sometimes give no real direction beyond “This is a concern” A SI that states to ‘look’ at or monitor something rarely indicates that it needs to be risk assessed. When the SI could quite clearly state this must be done to cover the regs.. rather than to just ‘look at’ or monitor.
Research has demonstrated that the greater the worker involvement within an organisation, the greater the health, safety and business performance. Such is the body of evidence that the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has made worker involvement one of its top three priorities over the next few years.
The HSE estimate that 60% of employees are not consulted by their employers over health and safety matters. This is criminal activity on a large scale. Since 1996 all employees – whether in a unionised organisation or not – are required by law to be consulted over a range of specified topics. The requirement has applied for 15 years and yet the majority of employees are denied their consultation rights.
When will the Government do something constructive to stop this substantial law breaking? All the evidence indicates that if employers complied with worker consultation laws, not only would health and safety standards improve but the efficiency of organisations would improve as well. Why won’t the HSE enforce the consultation laws under the Safety Representatives and Safety Committees Regulations 1977 and the Health and Safety (Consultation with Employees) Regulations 1996?
Experience is essential as is formal learning. Insist on minimum levels of learning by in house & consultants. Competent safety advisors give balanced risk v cost analysis and produce reasonable controls. Many of the unsound judgements made in terms of H&S are not made by competent advisors. The race to the bottom being suggested by some to make it easier for certificate level individuals to advise at senior levels and thereby directing budgets for companies is unwise. Everyone has to make a start but continual development in terms of experience and quals is necessary.
Less focus on reducing the number of regulations and more on improving the quality of regulations. Moving away from describing regulation as a burden and accepting the positive role that well constructed regulations play in allowing businesses to operate with certainty and safely.
There is far too much confusion between measures designed to promote workplace safety and measures introduced by community groups or employers to protect them against insurance claims. Tackling the structure of the insurance industry would have a more positive effect on business confidence than gutting health and safety legislation, which works fairly well.
Many people see Britain’s health and safety system as an international gold standard, and this should be celebrated, not caricatured. Having said that, where there is scope for consolidating or removing regulations that are out of date, then this should be done, but carefully.
Additionally, defunding the HSE may be counterproductive. Employers want advice from the HSE on compliance, and pro-active inspections and advice services can prevent the need for investigations and prosecutions further along the line.
I fully agree with youe statement Sam.
Additionaly during one of my NVQ 4 workshop sessions there was an agreement that the under funding of the HSE will change their strategy to prosecution rather than assistance and advice.