Posted By Steve Appleton Hi Richard, I’m not sure on the complexities of contract law, and whilst I agree with you that the agency as the employer must have responsibilities - in my experience, this is how it works in practice. You inform the agency that you want labour, specifying what they will be doing so that the agency can send suitably qualified & equipped workers. If when they arrive they are neither suitably qualified / equipped you should ask the agency to replace them. Once they start working for you the agency will then expect you to treat them pretty much as one of your own staff in respect to inductions, safety assessments, consultation, information & instruction etc. The agency would also expect you to provide additional training & safety equipment if you then go onto give them addition tasks that would warrant this. I suppose the sensible thing to do would be to only use the agency workers for the tasks originally agreed with the agency – but if you have a good agency worker you tend to hang onto them. I seem to remember an article recently in one of the safety magazines concerning agency workers - but unfortunately didn't read it so I can't provide more detail

Posted By Emma Righton-Corrick Hi Richard I concur with Steve Sedgwick, that if agency staff are working in your operation, doing the same job as your general employees, and you are providing training, tools, equipment, PPE and Supervision then they are your liability. Each case should be judged on its merrits but this is a rule of thumb. We allow for agency workers within our EL Insurance based on this concept.