CIPD - Health and safety at work

Health, safety and well-being

Revised April 2008

This factsheet gives introductory guidance. It:

introduces the law on health and safety at work
outlines employers’ obligations.

The legal position

The concept that employees should be safe at work is not a recent phenomenon. Legislation was developed in the 1970s to streamline the many different statutes governing safety issues making management responsible for the provision and maintenance of adequate standards and policies. But although there are many different statutes governing safety issues, health and safety is not only governed by legislation. Under what is known as ‘common law’ all employers have a duty of care imposed on them to protect their employees. There is also a term implied into all employment contracts requiring employers to take care of their employees’ health and safety. For example, employers must:

provide a safe place of work
provide a safe system of work
provide adequate plant and equipment
recruit competent and safety conscious staff.

If an employer fails to take reasonable care in any of these areas, an employee may have a number of claims, including the ability to resign and claim constructive unfair dismissal.

Employees, too, have responsibilities and should work with their employer to develop a safe place of work.

Main legislation

The legislation relating to health and safety is very extensive. One of the most important statutes is the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 (HSWA). All work places are covered by this legislation which says that an employer must do everything reasonably practicable to provide a safe and healthy workplace with adequate welfare facilities. HSWA has been supported and extended by various sets of regulations, codes of practice and guidance, all of which deal with various aspects of health and safety.

The Health and Safety Commission (HSC) and the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) were established under the HSWA to respectively decide upon and implement health and safety policy. In January 2008 a draft order was issued to implement the merger of the two bodies.

Some examples of other relevant legislation includes:

Occupiers Liability Act 1957
Health and Safety Inquiries (Procedure) Regulations 1975 (SI 1975/335)
Employer’s Health and Safety Policy Statements (Exemptions) Regulations 1975 (SI 1975/1584)
Health and Safety (First-Aid) Regulations 1981 (SI 1981/917)
Occupiers Liability Act 1984
Public Interest Disclosure Act 1988
Electricity at Work Regulations 1989 (SI 1989/635)
Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1992 (SI 1992/2051)
Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1992 (SI 1992/2932)
Manual Handling Operations Regulations 1992 (SI 1992/2793)
Workplace (Health, Safety, and Welfare) Regulations 1992(SI 1992/3004).
Personal Protective Equipment at Work Regulations 1992 (SI 1992/2966)
Health and Safety (Display Screen Equipment) Regulations 1992 (SI 1992/2792)
Health and Safety Information for Employees (Modifications and Repeals) Regulations 1995 (SI 1995/2923)
Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations 1995 (SI 1995/3163) – known as RIDDOR
Employment Rights Act 1996
Health and Safety (Consultation with Employees) Regulations 1996 (SI 1996/1513)
Fire Precautions (Workplace) Regulations 1997 (SI 1997/1840)
Health and Safety (Enforcing Authority) Regulations 1998 (SI 1998/494)
Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999 (SI 1999/3242)
Control of Substances Hazardous to Health Regulations 2002 (SI 2002/2677) – known as COSHH
Health and Safety (Miscellaneous Amendments) Regulations 2002 (SI 2002/2174)
Management of Health and Safety at Work and Fire Precautions (Workplace) (Amendment) Regulations 2003 (SI 2003/2457)
Control of Major Accident Hazards (Amendment) Regulations 2005 (SI 2005/1088)
Manufacture and Storage of Explosives Regulations 2005 (SI 2005/1082)
Control of Noise at Work Regulations 2005 (SI 2005/1643)
Control of Asbestos Regulations 2006 (SI 2006/2739)
The Health Act 2006 and the regulations made under it relating to the smoking ban in enclosed premises, including workplaces – see our factsheet on smoking at work for more information.
- Go to our Smoking at work factsheet
Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2007 (SI 2007/320).

The Working Time Regulations 1998 (SI 1998/1833), as subsequently amended, are also an important piece of health and safety legislation – see our factsheet on hours of work for more information.

Go to our factsheet on Working hours in the UK

In addition to extensive legislation, there is ongoing research and consultation concerning workplace health and safety. There is a long term strategy for workplace health and safety in Great Britain¹ designed to promote ‘a record of workplace health and safety that leads the world’.

Summary of employers’ health and safety obligations

Employers’ duties to provide a safe and healthy working environment arise from the core principles of negligence, contract, and the numerous specific statutory duties referred to above.

Employers should, at least:

publish a health and safety policy
arrange for the appointment of health and safety representatives
establish a health and safety committee if requested by a recognised trade union
appoint a competent person to evaluate risks and hazards
arrange periodic risk assessments
consult with employee health and safety representatives
prevent risks
inform staff of risks
combat risks at source
arrange protection from unavoidable risks
provide safety training
monitor and improve safety arrangements
provide health-risk surveillance
adapt work to the individual especially with respect to the design of workplaces
alleviate monotonous work
develop a prevention policy
appoint one or more competent persons to assist in undertaking preventative and protective measures
establish procedures to be followed in the event of serious and imminent danger to persons working in the organisation
require persons at work who are exposed to serious and imminent danger to be informed of the nature of the hazards and steps taken to protect them
provide comprehensible and relevant health and safety information
provide adequate health and safety training during working hours.

Producing a policy

All employers with more than five employees must have a statement of their health and safety policy. This statement must:

be written
be carefully thought through and demonstrate a commitment to managing health and safety
be workable
contains a general statement of intent to provide a safe and healthy working environment
be easily accessible and brought to the attention of all employees
give details of the health and safety responsibilities within the organisation
name key individuals
cover the systems and procedures in place
refer to other documents where appropriate
cover managing risk assessments
include arrangements for employee consultation, maintaining equipment, safe handling of substances
explain arrangements for training, supervision, accidents, first aid and emergencies
address stress, and drink and drug misuse.

Policies should be produced after consultation with employees and after conducting surveys on staff attitudes to health and safety. They should be also applied uniformly and there should be a system for regularly monitoring and reviewing the policy to ensure that it complies with current legislation.

A model safety policy with blanks to fill in is available from the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) although the adoption of a tailor-made policy is best practice and entirely 'off the shelf' policies are discouraged.

The obligation to provide a health and safety policy originally arises under section 2(3) of the HSWA. In cases of flagrant disregard, enforcement officers may issue improvement notices which if contravened lead to the ultimate potential sanctions of criminal penalties, including large fines and imprisonment.

Employers’ duties at a place of work

Some key examples of the employer’s duties with respect to a place of work include:

Under section 2 of HSWA, employers have an obligation to provide and maintain systems of work and a working environment which are, as far as is reasonably practicable, safe and without risk to health. The duty extends to providing maintenance of safe plant and systems of work, information, training, supervision and adequate support.
Under the Occupiers Liability Act 1957 a duties arise to provide employees and other visitors with a safe place of work.
All employers must take out and maintain an insurance policy known as an Employer's Liability Insurance Certificate to cover against any diseases or injuries to employees sustained in the workplace. The Certificate must be displayed where it is visible to employees. Employers who fail to display the Certificate or fail to insure against liability may be fined.
Fire is a hazard in all workplaces. By law, all organisations must take precautionary measures by controlling fire risks and providing fire escape routes. Employers have legal responsibility for fire safety and fire authorities no longer provide routine advice on the fire precautions employers should take. Employers must carry out a fire safety risk assessment; those with five or more employees have additional record keeping responsibilities. Employers must also inform workers of fire risks and provide training in fire safety procedures and escape drills.
The Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations 1992 lay down minimum standards for workplaces and work in or near buildings. Employer’s duties include:
- maintaining the workplace, equipment, devices and systems
- providing ventilation by sufficient quantity of fresh and purified air
- maintaining a reasonable temperature, and provision of thermometers
- ensuring suitable, sufficient and natural light so far as is reasonably practicable
- providing a clean workplace where waste materials must not be permitted to accumulate
- providing sufficient floor area, height and unoccupied space
- providing suitable and sufficient sanitary conveniences at readily accessible places.

Inspectors from the local authority Environmental Health Department, or HSE are responsible for enforcing health and safety law, and organisations can be prosecuted for breaches. All workplaces must be registered with either of these two bodies. Employees can report any breaches of the legislation or seek advice from them.

Risk assessment

A risk assessment is a vigilant examination of what, in a place of work, could cause harm to people so that the employer can assess if they have taken sufficient precautions to prevent damage and injury. Every employer must make a regular assessment of their premises to assess a number of risks. Self-employed workers have a duty to assess risks to themselves and others.

There are many detailed regulations that require risks in different industries to be assessed and HSE provides a variety of useful guidance. For example, guidance aimed at the commercial service and light industrial sectors identifies five steps² which require employers to:

look for the hazards
decide who might be harmed and how
evaluate the risks and decide whether the existing precautions are adequate or whether more should be done
record their findings
review their assessment and revise it if necessary.

Risk assessments must include, for example:

measures needed to comply with the health and safety fire precautions
assessment of the risks to young people, taking immaturity and other factors into account
assessment of risks to new and expectant mothers - failure to carry out such assessments can amount to sex discrimination.

Areas where risk assessments can be carried out are:

workstations for users of personal computers
assessment of noise levels
safety audits to identify potential hazards conducted by accredited auditors
handling and lifting heavy loads.

Following a risk assessment, employers must make arrangements to implement any necessary measures and arrange for the provision of appropriate information and training.

Accidents and disease at work

The Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations 1985 (known as RIDDOR) require employers to report any of the following to the HSE or the local council at once:

fatal accidents
major injury or conditions which require medical treatment
dangerous occurrences.

Other matters should be reported immediately, by telephone preferably, followed by a written report within seven days. These are:

accidents that prevent a worker from doing their normal work for more than three days
certain work-related diseases (poisoning, lung diseases, infections and other conditions must be reported when linked to specified types of work)
certain gas incidents.

Employers are legally obliged to provide first-aiders and inform all employees of the arrangements for getting first aid. Treatment of injured workers must be addressed without delay by an appointed first-aider.

An employer must record all workplace injuries, diseases, dangerous occurrences, or certain near accidents in an accident book. Employees must also report any accidents or illnesses caused by work and record the details in the accident book.

Absence management, stress and well-being

Absence management, both of short-term and long-term sickness, continues to be an issue. In particular, stress in the workplace has become a major cause of concern in recent years and has been the subject of several high-profile court cases and settlements. It is also quoted as one of the main reasons for absence. The employer’s duty of care and an increasing emphasis of EU legislation to make employers look after the physical as well as the psychological health of employees is bringing a move towards the concept of ‘wellness’ being promoted in some organisations. This aim aims to promote a preventative approach to dealing with illness issues.

For more information on these aspects of health in the workplace, see our factsheets on absence measurenent and management, occupational health, mental health and stress.

CIPD members can find out more about the legal aspects in our law FAQs.

Useful contacts

British Safety Council
Health and Safety Executive - provide a large range of guidance leaflets which are available on their website
Incident Contact Centre - for information on RIDDOR
Institution of Occupational Safety and Health
Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents
Trades Union Congress (TUC)

References

HEALTH AND SAFETY COMMISSION. (2004) A strategy for workplace health and safety in Great Britain to 2010 and beyond. London: HSC. Available at: http://www.hse.gov.uk/aboutus/hsc/strategy.htm
HEALTH AND SAFETY EXECUTIVE. (2006) Five steps to risk assessment. Rev ed. London: HSE. Available at: http://www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/raindex.htm

Health and safety at work