Danger Man: the HSE's Philip White

There is an eerie silence in the Health and Safety Executive’s London headquarters. The office floor is deserted apart from a lone figure hunched over a computer and a wilting pot plant. This is a scene of desolation which in these times of cutbacks and failures has been repeated in offices throughout the country. But thankfully, the HSE’s people have not been laid off; they’ve simply relocated to Liverpool.

Philip White

Philip White, the new face of the safety body’s construction division, is staying in London with his team, which he took over four months ago, at the peak of one of the construction industry’s most testing times.

White faces what promises to be an exacting tenure. A survey released by the HSE in June has revealed that a quarter of businesses are cutting health and safety spending in the downturn. The only good news is that there has been a reduction in site fatalities – down 26% to 53 in the year to April. This apparent contradiction is explained by the fact that there is less work around, and fewer people doing it. The fear is that once the work starts flowing again, so will the accidents.

So, how can the new chief inspector ensure that the construction industry keeps its eye on the ball and that hard-won successes in reducing injury and fatality figures continue throughout and beyond the recession?

Health and safety experience

White’s background in construction health and safety is impressive. He did a stint at the Department for Work and Pensions as head of health and safety sponsorship team for three and a half years where he advised ministers on the work of the HSE. But before this, he served as head of operations in the construction division of the HSE. “I’ve had experience getting my hands dirty,” he says, “and I’ve investigated a lot of fatal accidents.”

And he has overseen health and safety statistics in a recession before: “The rates drop simply because there are fewer people employed. Also there are fewer new and younger men joining the industry. They’re the ones who tend to be the victims of accidents. Coming out of the recession can be the biggest problem for us.”

So while the industry will be breathing a sigh of relief once the economy begins to revive, the HSE will be frantically trying to ensure injury rates do not soar, as they did in the post-recession years of the nineties.

Asked how exactly he will drive this delicate operation, White points to the safety body’s strategy “Be Part of the Solution” which was launched on 3 June. It aims to renew the focus on safety by training more site inspectors. “Joe Public would say the best thing for HSE to do would be to inspect one building site after another. That is a key part of our work,” he says. “But we also need to bring about a cultural change. If there are a lot of accidents in a particular area, it’s about addressing this and changing the process.” He uses as an example roofing with safety netting placed underneath, now a commonplace practice. “I don’t think we would ever have achieved that if inspectors had gone out inspecting one site after another, without being strategic.”

There is also the tower crane register, which Building’s Safer Skylines campaign called for. The HSE has said it is “fully committed” to it, and will launch a public consultation on 20 July. It is due to run until 9 October.

Joe Public would say the best thing for HSE to do would be to inspect one building site after another

He is still assessing other areas he wishes to focus on, but in the SME sector, which the strategy is also targeting, White wants to focus on roof workers in the domestic sector and manual handling, as well as welfare provisions. He says: “We’ve recruited 24 people from the SME sector who started training with us on 15 June. We want to use their skill and expertise, and their familiarity with the industry. They’ll be involved with enforcement and serving prohibition notices.”

White also believes that leadership and a cultural change will be the “key” this time around in coping with the upturn. “Ten years ago, you wouldn’t see prominent individuals such as Bovis Lend Lease chairman John Spanswick standing up and talking about health and safety as you do now,” he says. “This cultural change needs to continue.”

White’s first big challenge in his hearts and minds campaign comes in the light of an HSE survey to assess attitudes to health and safety in the recession. It found that 20% of business leaders thought it was not at the centre of their business, and 25% admitted their organisation would face pressure to cut their health and safety budget.

But other challenges lie nearer home. The HSE has recently fallen victim to criticisms from several sides. General secretary of Ucatt Alan Ritchie has questioned White’s own effectiveness and safety groups such as Construction Safety Campaign and Families Against Corporate Killers (FACK) have attacked the HSE for not coming down heavier on firms that break safety laws.

FACK wants individual directors whose firms break safety rules to be held legally accountable. “The lack of prosecution has become the rule rather than the exception,” says Hilda Palmer, facilitator of FACK.

On the Ucatt criticism, White says: “I don’t think that HSE’s approach to regulating the sector was wrong, so it wasn’t as though I needed to start a revolution.” Nor does he think personal prosecutions are always the right approach. “Often it is a multitude of factors that combine and result in accidents,” he says. “It is simplistic to assume every incident comes down to one individual.

“We want sustained improvements as opposed to grand gestures and unnecessary initiatives. Meaningful change doesn’t come overnight and nor does it come if productive long-term strategies are cast aside.”

White prefers to take a whole-industry approach to accident prevention. “I’d like to see the current health and safety figures continuing, not just for fatal accidents, but also for ill-health. I want to see changes in culture. In five years’ time, for example, it would be great to see that it has become the norm to have dust suppression on sites, which would protect against ill-health.”

It’s a daunting task and clearly it’s taking its toll. As the interview draws to a close, White stands up, stretches and scans the deserted room. “They should have rooms with beds up here. I’m exhausted.” You get the impression he is only half joking.