Safety in letters

‘So what do we actually have to do?’ is a common enough question when it comes to health and safety, especially from smaller companies.

Well, thanks to a new joint guide from the Health and Safety Executive and the Institute of Directors, company directors now have guidance to ensure proper health and safety management in their companies.

The HSE/IoD tie-up is intriguing. It’s probably designed to appeal to those top managers who think that HSE material is not intended for them. The message seems to be, “No, we’re serious, this is for directors and doing this is core to running the show.”

How you regard the new guidance depends on whether you subscribe to the ‘glass half empty’ or ‘glass half full’ school of senior management.

It is worth bearing in mind that the alternative could have been extra legal duties for directors. After all, new safety duties have been strongly lobbied for in recent years by various groups, who point out that the new Corporate Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide Act (CMA) is about companies, not directors.

Employers’ bodies, including the ECA, told the government that the CMA should not cover individual directors. That view has prevailed, at least for now, and while the new guidance does not put any extra legal duties on directors, it shows what ‘good’ looks like when it comes to directors engaging in health and safety.

Basically, the new HSE guidelines require directors to:

• Have an H&S policy – the board should ‘own’ and understand issues;
• Ensure H&S arrangements are adequately resourced and competent advice is obtained, and listened to;
• Ensure the board monitors H&S, giving enough weight to reporting management measures and incident data, and checking whether management measures and risk controls are effective;
• Ensure the board reviews H&S performance at least once a year.

A question of safety

These requirements are backed by useful information on core measures and other ‘good practice’ measures. Ten key questions in the guide provide a thought-provoking checklist:

1. How do you demonstrate the board’s commitment to H&S?

2. What do you do to ensure board-level reviews of H&S?

3. What have you done to ensure that the company, at all levels including the board, is getting competent advice?

4. How do you ensure all staff are trained and competent in their responsibilities?

5. How confident are you that your workforce is consulted properly on H&S matters, and that their concerns are reaching the right level?

6. What systems are in place to ensure risk assessment and sensible control measures?

7. How well do you know what is happening in-company and what assessments are made to inform you?

8. What information does the board receive on H&S – performance, reports on injuries and work-related ill-health?

9. What targets have you set to improve H&S, and do you check your performance against others in the sector?

10. Where changes in working arrangements have significant H&S implications, how is the board notified?

The HSE normally produces good, clear guidance and this latest booklet is no exception. In this case, this guidance is mainly for big businesses.

This is not the best way to appeal to small businesses, so expect a boiled-down version on the HSE website soon.

Even so, remember that this guidance applies to all company directors, so it is required reading for anyone running an m&e contracting business.