Health and Safety Audits
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IN THIS ISSUE |
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WELCOME |
It is a wise person who goes back to basics from time to time to look at the foundation on which everything else is built. In terms of health and safety it is easy to become engrossed in the detail and lose the big picture - to go off on a tangent away from the priority items that deliver most benefit.
So, in this issue, that is exactly what I want to do, to focus your attention for a few minutes on the fundamental questions:
- What are the real health and safety issues in your organisation? Are they the same as last year?
- Have you missed any significant changes that have affected the health and safety risks?
- Are you spending your time, effort and money to produce the greatest benefit?
The answers to these and similar questions is to conduct a health and safety Audit. This is the activity that takes a careful look at how effective your efforts are in managing health and safety in your organisation.
This is an ideal time – when many organisations are setting their budgets for the coming year – for those responsible for health and safety to undertake an Audit to support their bid for health and safety funding.
David Skews, (CEO)
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HEALTH AND SAFETY AUDITS |
Under the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999
Every employer shall make and give effect to such arrangements as are appropriate, having regard to the nature of his activities and the size of his undertaking, for the effective planning, organisation, control, monitoring and review of the preventive and protective measures
(Section 5.1 - Health and Safety Arrangements)
What this means in practice is that every employer is not only responsible for appropriate planning, organisation, control etc of suitable health and safety arrangements but must also conduct regular monitoring and reviews of the measures to ensure they continue to be effective. We refer to this activity under the title of Health and Safety Audit.
In case you are wondering, these regulations apply to companies of every size. If, however, there are fewer than 5 employees, there is no legal obligation to document the arrangements. However, this begs the question about what evidence you have of completing the work if you don´t document anything.
What is a Health & Safety Audit?
For those who are not familiar with the concept, a Health and Safety Audit is similar in principle to a financial audit where an independent body examines the books, invoices, receipts and financial procedures of a company to ensure the organisation is financially safe and healthy. Of course this process can go spectacularly wrong as evidenced by a couple of major financial scandals in the USA. However, for the vast majority of companies, it works very well.
Similar procedures apply in the field of health and safety but in this case the focus is less on financial matters and more on human safety and welfare (though there can be significant financial issues as well).
Audit is one of the major components of our Health and Safety Framework, which encompasses the whole range of activities involved with a full Health and Safety Management System. You can read all about them on our website by following the links above.
However, briefly, an Audit involves completing a detailed questionnaire based on observations around the workplace, examination of documentation and interviews with members of staff. It covers 5 major aspects of health and safety, viz:
- Health & Safety policy.
- Allocation of responsibilities and development of a health and safety culture.
- Health & safety objectives.
- Measuring systems.
- Health & safety performance reviewing systems.
By following the same procedure each time, it is easy to track changes from one year to the next. Are things improving or deteriorating? It also helps to pinpoint where action is most pressing and therefore it assists enormously in setting priorities and planning actions.
So what are the benefits in real terms?
- If you have never conducted an Audit before, then it is like going to your doctor for the first time for a thorough medical health check. If everything is fine, then you can sleep easy at night. On the other hand, if there are problems, then the sooner they are identified and addressed, the less likely they are to end in tragedy.
- Once you have established a cycle of Audits, you have documented evidence of continuous improvement in health and safety performance (always assuming you act on the findings). That is extremely valuable evidence if, for example, you need to demonstrate your health and safety credentials when bidding for contracts. You can use it to negotiate reduced insurance premiums and it can do wonders for your public relations.
By way of examples, a few years back we were able to negotiate an ongoing reduction of £50,000 on annual insurance premiums for a major IT company and only this year have negotiated a reduction of £150,000 on premiums for a company in the leisure sector. These are significant savings for major companies but we have numerous examples of equivalent reductions for many smaller organisations.
- Investing in health and safety can be expensive and may yield little tangible benefit if done in a haphazard way. If, however, finance and resources are targeted in a planned way it can bring significant benefits to the organisation´s bottom line, in addition to making the workplace a safer environment for your employees.
- A further benefit that should not be too lightly discounted is that you can be seen to comply with the law. If you have seen directors on TV entering the courts to face manslaughter charges, you might appreciate the mental anguish they are going through. For the most part these are decent people but they have been negligent somewhere along the line and the consequences are catastrophic for them and, of course, for the people who have been injured or killed. The better alternative is to know that you have done all that is reasonably practicable to eliminate or reduce risks in the workplace.
Timing
When is the best time to conduct an Audit? It obviously depends on individual circumstances but, considering what is at stake, there is never a better time than the present.
Many organisations are also coming to the end/start of their financial year so what better time to develop your plan of action and put a little something aside in the budget for health and safety in the coming year.
If you have the skills and experience in-house then you can undertake Audits yourself. Otherwise, give us a call and we would be pleased to help you launch the coming year as one of positive improvement in health and safety.
AS a Health and Safety Consultancy, we are not merely in the business of pointing out serious hazards and risks in your organisation, we are often able to point you toward significant cost savings that you might not have realised were available, so why not give us a call on
01744 766000 or use our Enquiry Form to ask for more information.
See edpFRAMEWORK for a broader perspective on Managing Health & Safety
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CASE LAW |
Following the theme of our main article, it is often the case that poor management of health and safety goes hand in hand with poor business management. So, if you are looking to hire a contractor with whom you feel safe, it is probably worth looking at the general way in which their company is being run. The evidence of such an investigation should validate the documentary evidence submitted by the company.
An example that illustrates this principle is a plastics and rubber seals moulding company in Morpeth, Northumberland. In February 2005, the director was disqualified from directorships or taking any part in company management for 14 years.
There was a combination of reasons for this judgement, including:
- Obtaining finance under false pretences
- False accounting
- Most significant from a health and safety point of view, he failed to carry out routine safety inspections and risk assessments, leading to serious injury of one of his employees.
You can read the full story on the government website at http://www.gnn.gov.uk/content/detail.asp?ReleaseID=150363
The moral of the story is that a health and safety audit is just as important as a financial audit, if not more so.
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LEGAL MONITOR |
Since the last newsletter, we have expanded legal pages on our website so they now include:
All the pages are worth a visit, but Changes to Health and Safety Law is particularly important at this time since the April deadline is rapidly approaching when a number of legal amendments are to be introduced.
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David Skews, (CEO)
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EDP Health Safety & Environment Consultants Ltd
Lakeside, Alexandra Park, Prescot Road, St. Helens, Merseyside, UK
Telephone: +44(0)1744 766000
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