Health and Safety at Work

The HSW regulations have been put in place to ensure you take care of all those you work in conjunction with - employees, contractors, clients or customers. The aim of the regulations is to reduce damage by assessing all potential risks and to create action plans for emergencies.

Compliance with industry specific regulations will normally be sufficient. However, where HSW Regulations go further than those of more specific legislation, extra measures will be required in order to comply.

Who Does it Apply to?

  • Employers
  • Employees
  • Young Persons

What the employer needs to consider:

The risks the employees are exposed to as well as the risks exposed to others. If here are any changes made within the company, the employer needs to once again review and assess risks that may occur.

When employing a young person:

The employer needs to take particular account of the inexperience, lack of awareness of risks and their immaturity. Also, the fitting-out and the layout of the workplace and workstation needs to be assessed as well as the nature, degree and duration of exposure to physical, biological and chemical agents.

The form, range, and use of work equipment and the way they are handled need to be considered. In addition to the organization of process and activities, and the extent of the health and safety training provided or that needs to be provided to a young person.

Additionally, the risks from agents, processes and work listed in the Annex Council Directive on the protection of young people at work need to be considered.

Where the employer employs 5 or more employees, he has to record:

The significant findings of his assessment and any group of his employees that are identified by it (the assessment) as being especially at risk.

Actions to Take:

Health and safety arrangements:

The employer needs to make and give effect to arrangements which are appropriate, with regards to the nature of his activities and the size of his undertaking for the effective planning, organisation, control, monitoring and review of the preventative and protective measures.

Health surveillance:

Every employer shall ensure that his employees are provided with such health surveillance as is appropriate having regard to the risks to their health and safety which are identified by the assessment.

Health and safety assistance:

Every employer needs to appoint one or more person to assist him with the above two points and also to help him with the relevant statutory provisions imposed upon him and by Part 2 of the Fire Precautions (Workplace) Regulations (Discussed below) where a person is appointed, he needs to make arrangements to ensure that there is adequate co-operation between them.

 

He shall ensure that the person(s) appointed have the time available for them to fulfill their function and that the means available at their disposal are adequate having regards to the size of the undertaking, the risks his employees are exposed to and the distribution of those risks throughout the undertaking.

 

Anyone appointed that is not in his employment need to be informed of the factors known by him to affect, or suspected to affect the health and safety of any other person who may be affected by the conduct of his undertaking and the access to information (information discussed below). The person appointed should be given information about any person who is employed by him under a fixed-term contract or employed in an employment business.

Information for employees:

The employer needs to provide employees with comprehensible and relevant information on the risks to their health and safety identified by the assessment, the preventative and protective measures. They need to know the person whom is nominated to assist him.

Also, before employing a child, their parents need to have the above information.

Capabilities and training:

The employer needs to ensure that employees are provided with adequate health and safety training on being recruited into the employer's undertaking, and on their being exposed to new or increased risks because of possible reasons e.g. change of responsibility.

This training should take place during working hours.

The employer also needs to inform the employee of any special occupational qualifications or skills required to be held by the employee if he is to carry out his work safely.

Protection of young persons:

The employers needs to ensure that the young person is protected from any risks to their health and safety which are a consequence of their lack of experience, absence of awareness of existing or potential risks or the fact that the young person is not fully matured.

They shall not employ a young person for work which is beyond his physical or psychological capability, for work involving harmful exposure to agents which are toxic or carcinogenic or that may cause any other damage to ones health and cause exposure to harmful radiation.

Additionally, work involving the risk of accidents which may be reasonably assumed cannot be recognized or avoided by young persons. They can neither be employed where there is a risk to their health from extreme cold or heat, noise or vibration.

In determining whether the work will prove harmful for a young person, results of the assessment need to be considered.