What is oc­cu­pa­tion­al health and safety?

Around 1.4 million UK workers ex­per­i­enced work-related illnesses in 2017/18 and more than 600,000 injuries occurred at work, according to stat­ist­ics by the country’s Health and Safety Executive (HSE). Many health-related issues are avoidable which is why the HSE provides guidance for employers to create a safe and risk-free working en­vir­on­ment. But what exactly is oc­cu­pa­tion­al health and safety?

Oc­cu­pa­tion­al or workplace health and safety describes services and reg­u­la­tions put in place by both employers as regulated by gov­ern­ment agencies to ensure that employees can remain safe and healthy whilst working. In the UK, the HSE oversees and enforces work-related health and safety laws. But its policies do not just benefit employees. Research has shown that healthy staff are be­ne­fi­cial for busi­nesses and boost pro­ductiv­ity.

The HSE is an in­de­pend­ent agency which drafts and enforces health and safety policies. Its guidance helps busi­nesses to identify the key areas they must focus on to provide oc­cu­pa­tion­al health for their staff. There are three main aspects employers must focus on when assessing work-related injuries and illness:

• What can cause injuries/illness at work? For example, dangerous machinery, hazardous chemicals, drafts, etc.
• How can these issues be solved to minimise the risk for employees to fall ill? What actions need to be taken to ensure a healthy workforce?
• Which measures should be put in place to prevent injuries and illness?

According to UK reg­u­la­tions, employers are also not allowed to dis­crim­in­ate against disabled personnel and must make pro­vi­sions to ensure that all employees can fulfil their duties. Im­port­antly, if an employer fails to provide safety for their workers, they can be pro­sec­uted under criminal law by the HSE and under civil law by their staff. It, therefore, makes sense for companies to draft com­pre­hens­ive oc­cu­pa­tion­al risk as­sess­ments.

But what are the oc­cu­pa­tion­al health and safety reg­u­la­tions in the UK? The HSE provides different reg­u­la­tions for different in­dus­tries. That makes sense because an office worker won’t be exposed to the same risks as a con­struc­tion worker or a chemical plant labor­at­ory assistant. That is why HSE guidance is broken down into various in­dus­tries. Let’s look at an example of this.

The Con­struc­tion (Design and Man­age­ment) Reg­u­la­tions 2015 is a dedicated law that sets out both an employer’s but also employee’s duties when working on con­struc­tion-related projects. In other words, everyone involved has legal duties under these reg­u­la­tions. For example, designers such as ar­chi­tects or engineers have a duty to ensure reduce con­struc­tion-related fore­see­able risks. Principal con­tract­ors must ensure that workers adhere to health and safety reg­u­la­tions at work, whilst workers have a duty to report any breaches of health or safety.

Con­struc­tion projects that last more than 30 working days and require over 20 workers must be notified using a F10 form. There are also certain general pro­vi­sions con­struc­tion site managers must make for workers. These include providing helmets and high vis­ib­il­ity clothing for employees on-site.

At this point, it’s worth making a dis­tinc­tion between ‘safety’ and ‘health’. In terms of the con­struc­tion industry, safety includes issues such as scaf­fold­ing, working at height, working on roofs, and fire safety. For example, con­struc­tion sites are legally required to install rescue plans when work at height (e.g. on scaffolds) is performed. On the other hand, health risks con­sti­tute topics such as dust, paint chemicals and fumes, asbestos and noise. For some health risks such as dust, the HSE provides guidance for workers to ensure their own safety.

All employers in the UK have a legal duty to assess work-related risks, educate their staff on these risks and strategies to avoid harm, and monitor health and safety. Busi­nesses must also ensure that visitors (e.g. visitors to con­struc­tion sites) are safe (e.g. by wearing a helmet at all times). One fairly common measure many office-based employers have installed is briefing new members of staff on the office’s fire exits and evac­u­ation policies. Regular fire drills are also common. Larger en­ter­prises usually have the funds to hire dedicated health and safety personnel to train and instruct staff on workplace safety. Typically, companies will ask their staff to take re­fresh­ers in its health and safety policies and action plan every year.

But it’s not only employers who need to be aware of oc­cu­pa­tion­al safety rules, employees have a duty to learn about their company’s reg­u­la­tions and make sure they can demon­strate an un­der­stand­ing of actions that need to be taken in case of an emergency.

Although some in­dus­tries will have stricter guidance on health and safety mon­it­or­ing and pro­vi­sions than others, there are certain re­spons­ib­il­it­ies most employers share to ensure their staff are safe and healthy. These include:

• Min­im­ising danger at work, whether that risk ori­gin­ates from machinery, long hours in front of a screen, animals or other people (e.g. ill pop­u­la­tions in hospitals)
• Employers must ensure that the staff they hire have been trained to operate the tools a business requires them to use; al­tern­at­ively, they may provide com­pre­hens­ive training for new staff.
• Employees and employers have an ob­lig­a­tion to report and log all accidents at work, no matter how minor.
• Employees have a duty to let their employers know of any health issues or med­ic­a­tions that could affect their work.

In case of a breach or failure to provide adequate health and safety at work, staff can bring their case forward to the HSE which can take a company or in­sti­tu­tion to court. For example, in 2013, the Uni­ver­sity of Edinburgh was found guilty of failing to assess the risk of animal allergens in its labor­at­ory. This had health con­sequences for one of its employees. The uni­ver­sity was fined £10,000.

But fines can be sub­stan­tially higher. Health­care man­age­ment firm HC One Limited was fined £270,000 for failing to secure household and jan­it­ori­al cleaning products that remained un­at­ten­ded in care home wards. The case was brought forward because an elderly resident ingested chlorine tablets that had been lying out in the open.

However, the enforcing authority of the HSE only covers certain in­dus­tries and work­places such as factories, hospitals, building sites, schools, and gov­ern­ment premises. Other sites such as offices, res­taur­ants, retail premises, nurseries, pubs and museums are overseen by local au­thor­it­ies. There are also spe­cial­ist agencies such as the En­vir­on­ment­al Health authority which deals with pollution and food hygiene issues. Meanwhile, the police look after road traffic incidents.

In general, failure to adhere to and maintain strict health and safety reg­u­la­tions can become costly for employers. The following step-by-step guide outlines how to ensure your company’s oc­cu­pa­tion­al health and safety is in order.

If you’ve recently set up a business or are ready to hire employees for your company, here are steps you can take to ensure you’re not in breach of health and safety reg­u­la­tions.

1. Assess workplace and work-related risks that could cause injury or harm to employees. It’s worth drafting com­pre­hens­ive oc­cu­pa­tion­al risk as­sess­ments to ensure all risks are properly de­term­ined. Failure to identify or include certain risks could bring about legal action if something happens as a result of such neg­li­gence.
2. Appoint a person who can help you to achieve your health and safety goals. This could be yourself or a con­sult­ant. If you choose to oversee your business’ oc­cu­pa­tion­al health and safety, it’s a good idea to become familiar with The Man­age­ment of Health and Safety at Work Reg­u­la­tions 1999.
3. Draft a dedicated health and safety policy which all employees and man­age­ment must adhere to. If your company has five or more employees, you must write a policy. These documents should include your company’s intent or goal, your re­spons­ib­il­it­ies as an employer as well as the duties staff must fulfil to ensure health and safety at work. To draft such policies, it can be useful to speak to your staff and workers about the issues they deem risky to their health and safety.
4. Provide a first aid kit at work and nominate and train an employee on how to use it properly.
5. Keep a dedicated log of incidents and accidents.
6. Brief staff on a building’s fire safety reg­u­la­tions.
7. The HSE provides health and safety posters and leaflets which companies must display or hand out, re­spect­ively, to their staff.
8. Make sure you get employers’ liability insurance to avoid bank­ruptcy in case of com­pens­a­tion claims.
9. Improve the workplace to become safer. Managing health and safety is an ongoing task. By mon­it­or­ing incidents, companies can take measures to improve work-related safety risks. You should also provide continued and refresher training to ensure all members of staff remain in the know of any changes.

As the UK prepares to leave the European Union, the HSE has published dedicated guidance in case of a no-deal Brexit. However, the authority has assured that any EU-regulated health and safety laws will become domestic law as part of the trans­ition. As such, not much is going to change for employers in the fore­see­able future.

Please note the legal dis­claim­er relating to this article.