Managing Health and Safety at Work

Institute of Leadership & Management

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• Print ISBN: 9780080464268
• eBook ISBN: 9781136384424
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Business General
• Index: Business

Super series are a set of workbooks to accompany the flexible learning programme specifically designed and developed by the Institute of Leadership & Management (ILM) to support their Level 3 Certificate in First Line Management. The learning content is also closely aligned to the Level 3 S/NVQ in Management. The series consists of 35 workbooks. Each book will map on to a course unit (35 books/units).

Session B

The organization’s responsibility for health, safety and the environment

1 Introduction

The Health and Safety at Work, etc. Act 1974 (HSWA) is a general enabling Act that allows Ministers to introduce more detailed Regulations and Approved Codes of Practice (ACOPS) relating to health and safety without taking every single one through Parliament.

It is not a statutory requirement for organizations to follow each ACOP, but the Courts will regard following them as evidence that an organization is abiding by the ‘letter and the spirit’ of HSWA and subsequent Regulations. Any organization that ignores ACOPs, where they exist, does so at its peril.

1.1 Your liability under the law

It is a sound principle of English law that ignorance is no defence.

This makes perfect sense, for without it, the speeding motorist, the burglar and the murderer would all claim that they’didn’t know they were doing anything wrong’. This principle also applies to all Health and Safety law, and this can be a frightening thought.

In practice, you cannot possibly remember every aspect of every part of the law. What you must do is to check for your own specific job and team responsibilities which aspects of the law may apply. For example, if your team works with display screens, then, either directly or through your manager, you need to check how the Regulations and/or ACOP will apply to their work.

The principle that ‘ignorance is no defence’ is not as onerous to apply as it may sound. It simply requires you to check how the law affects what you are doing specifically; it doesn’t demand that you know everything about Health and Safety Law – there are few people indeed who could claim that knowledge.

These Regulations are sometimes referred to as the ‘six pack’. They comprise:

the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999;

the Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations 1992;

the Manual Handling Operations Regulations 1992;

the Health and Safety (Display Screen Equipment) Regulations 1992;

the Personal Protective Equipment at Work Regulations 1992;

the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998.

Another very significant piece of legislation is the Control of Substances Hazardous to Health Regulations (COSHH) 1999.

In this session we will review all these Regulations, and, in addition, look at the organization’s responsibility for protecting the environment.

2 Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999 (MHSWR)

These regulations help to spell out the duties and responsibilities of employers much more explicitly than HSWA.

MHSWR applies to all kinds of work, apart from sea-going ships.

2.1 Main provisions of MHSWR

According to HSE:

Their ma...

Table of contents

• Front Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Series preface
• Unit specification
• Workbook introduction
• Session A Background to health and safety legislation
• Session B The organization’s responsibility for health, safety and the environment
• Session C Accidents and their causes
• Session D The management of safety
• Session E Practical accident prevention
• Session F Coping with accidents
• Performance checks
• Reflect and review