Health & Safety
The law of health and safety at work, as like much protective legislation, has been developed in a fragmented way over the last two centuries. In many cases, its growth has been brought about as a result of public outcry at, for instance, the appalling conditions under which children worked in the Lancashire textile industry in the early 1800’s.
Any business has responsibilities by law to ensure that all employees within the company and any people affected by their business (e.g customers, suppliers) are cared for in a reasonable manor. These laws shouldn’t be looked at as a check list to perform the minimum required; they can benefit your business by making the environment a more enjoyable workplace, hence improving morale, productivity and enticing potential new employees.
Your duties within the health and safety remit include the following:
- Carry out a thorough risk assessment on to business environment, practices and people.
- Draw up a health and safety policy to provide best practices for operations within the workplace.
- Ensuring the workplace meets minimum standards of comfort and cleanliness.
- The measures to record serious activities and injuries, with best practice scenario.
- You must comply with legalisation designed to have minimal impact on the environment. You may have to hit quotas depending on the industry of the business.
Failing to follow health and safety procedures can be costly, resulting in heavy fines and the possibility of imprisonment. This could obviously result in closure of your business and legal action.
Breaches of health and safety can incur both criminal and civil liability.
Criminal liability – A crime is an offence against the state. Criminal liability refers to the duties and responsibilities under statue, principally the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 and regulations, and the penalties that can be imposed by the criminal courts, mainly fines and imprisonment.
Civil liability – A civil action generally involves negligence and / or breach of a statutory duty. In such actions a claimant sues a defendant for a remedy that is beneficial to the claimant. In most cases this takes the form of damages, a form of financial compensation. In a substantial number of cases the plaintiff will agree to settle out of court.
The Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 includes the following areas.
1. Duties of employers – It is the duty of every employer, so far as is reasonably practicable, to ensure the health, safety and welfare at work of all its employees. In particular this includes; provision and maintenance of machinery and ensuring the correct use of equipment via training and practices.
2. Duties of Employees – It is the duty of every employee while at work to take reasonable care for the health and safety of themselves and others. This includes operating machinery in the correct manor - No person shall intentionally or recklessly interfere with or misuse anything provided.
3. Duties of employers to persons other than their employees – Every employer must conduct his undertaking in such a way as to ensure, so far as is reasonably practicable, that persons not in direct employment (e.g contractors) are not subject to health risks.
4. Duties of occupiers of premises to persons other than their employees – The person or persons in control of the premises must take such measures to ensure, so far as is reasonably practicable, that the premises, all means of access thereto and any plant or substances in the premises are safe and without risks to health.
5. Duties of designers, manufacturers, importers and suppliers – This ensures that the articles are so designed and constructed that it will be safe to use within the workplace. Sufficient testing should have been carried out to determine the articles safety. Adequate information such as contents, components and instructions should be supplied with the articles to ensure the product is best applied.
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