24 October, 2011

As part of European Health & Safety Week, we have invited Safety Cornwall Ltd to write a short blog about the health & safety responsibilities we each have within the workplace…

Health and safety applies to each and every one of us whilst we are at work, whether we are employers, employees or other workers such as contractors, volunteers, or whatever.  Like it or not, we cannot avoid our responsibilities in health and safety law.  If you are an employer, you have a duty in law to ensure, so far as is reasonably practicable, the health, safety and welfare of your employees and you must also ensure the health and safety of non-employed persons such as members of the public, visitors to your premises, service users, etc.

It is important to understand who is an 'employer'.  This includes sole traders; those who run a business partnership (eg, husband and wife teams); directors of limited companies; volunteer members of sports committees or councils; trustees of charitable organisations.  All have a duty of care in health and safety law, as above.

Compliance with health and safety law is essentially a two-fold requirement for employers.  Firstly, employers must develop health and safety management systems which are proportionate to the work activities undertaken and/or the services or amenities provided.  Secondly, employers must ensure that operational practices and procedures in the workplace are inherently safe and compliant with regulatory requirements and relevant guidance or standards. 

Employees must be informed, instructed and trained in regard to working safely, followed by adequate supervision.  Employees must co-operate with safe working practices, failing which, they too may become criminally liable if they cause harm or injury to person(s).

Employers must also remember the joint duty of care where contractors are involved.  There is a clear and important duty upon employers to pre-check the credentials and competence of contractors and also to ensure that they plan, prepare and execute their contract work safely.  For example, the construction industry unfortunately experiences by far the highest number of fatalities, usually attributable to falls from height.  Alas also, and proportionate to the numbers of persons employed in the industry, agriculture is by far the most dangerous industry, with ten-times the ratio of people killed than in construction.  Failure to check out and monitor the work-safety performance of your contractors, may well result in shared culpability if injury occurs.

The consequences of health and safety failures are becoming increasingly more serious.  The HSE is now moving towards a cost-recovery scheme where the investigation of an incident leads to enforcement action; court fines have recently been increased quite dramatically; where it can be shown that a gross breach of a relevant duty of care resulted in a fatality, charges for manslaughter may now be brought, with potential for custodial sentence. 

Whatever, the HSE's declared intent is "to prevent people being killed, injured or made ill by work", and who can argue with that?

David Shepherd is the Managing Director of Safety Cornwall Ltd. David is a Corporate Member of the Chartered Institute of Environmental Health (MCIEH) and has spent some 30 plus years working as a health and safety inspector for several council enforcing authorities, both within the UK and New Zealand.  He has been in private practice as a health and safety adviser and consultant since 1988.  Safety Cornwall is based in Truro and is retained by all sectors of local industry and commerce throughout Cornwall and beyond, with extensive expertise as safety advisers within the agricultural sector.