Rank: Guest 
|
Posted By Kirsa Edwards
Can anybody tell me if there is a legal requirement to have a full time H&S officer on site? I've heard that if you employ over 100+ people there is a legal requirement to have someone employed full time in this capaity? We are a manufacturing company employing circa 130 people, we have someone who does H&S but this is in addition to their other duties and we need to know whether we should look at this being a full time role. Can anyone please shed any light on this for me? Thank you.
|
|
|
|
|
|
Rank: Guest
|
Posted By Sean Fraser
Kirsa,
Someone has told you an absolute where none exists - a common problem in our field where rumour becomes fact! The Management of Health and Safety at Work Regs 1999 state that the employer needs to "appoint one or more competent persons to assist him in undertaking the measures he needs to comply with the requirements and prohibitions imposed upon him . . .". How you achieve this is based on the nature of the business and the risk involved, as well as size, distribution, activities and organisation/culture. For example, a small manufacturing company may chose to employ a permanant manager (could be part-time though), whereas a nationwide network of office-based workers may chose to engage in consultants for specialist advice and may have someone notionally in charge of H&S.
In short, the decision on how you comply with this requirement is down to you - if you believe that in order to meet your statutory obligations that you need a full time H&S professional, then go ahead. But no-one can force you to do so, if the level of risk and the nature of the organisation does not support it. But beware of the word "competent" - just giving the title to someone as part of a number of other (perhaps mutually exclusive) duties does not address the issue UNLESS they have sufficient knowledge and experience to discharge their own obligations effectively AND their position is not compromised by commercial pressures, say.
If you want to chat about this some more then drop me an email.
|
|
|
|
|
|
Rank: Guest
|
Posted By Nick Higginson
Kirsa
I have to disagree totally with Sean's response. The Health & Safety (Competent Persons) Regs state that manufacturing companies with over 130 staff must employ a full-time safety advisor. Furthermore, they state that you must pay a salary of £50000 p.a. with a Jaguar company car and the person must be home based.
Kind regards
Nick
PS My CV is in the post.
PPS Only joking, Sean is absolutely correct.
|
|
|
|
|
|
Rank: Guest
|
Posted By Dave Wilson
Would be interested to know who told you this porkie?
|
|
|
|
|
|
Rank: Guest
|
Posted By Dave Daniel
No this is not true. What you are required to have is an adequate level of competent advice - no more. There are no "numbers of employees" criteria. When I was in the Motor Industry years ago, and with 100,000 employees we established that a ratio of about 1 Safety Engineer to 1,000-3,000 employees was about right for staffing. Perhaps with all the extra bureacracy this might come down slightly but not that much!
The HSE seem to not like consultants and in the last regulatory offering stipulated that in-house competent personnel should be appointed in preference to external sources.
In practice, in-house staff with only a part-time safety role will rapidly be de-skilled as they struggle to keep up with a complex subject and will find themselves unable to juggle this and all their other roles. By contrast, H&S is what I do all day so I (have to) make the time to keep up to date. As a result the preference for in-house competence is not an option for most UK employers, especially SME's. We actually specialise in providing H&S support to SME's in the Midlands because of this skills difficulty.
Regards
Dave Daniel Technical Director PRM Ltd
|
|
|
|
|
|
Rank: Guest
|
Posted By Geoff Burt
Dave - That's what I like, a subtle advertisement. I'll need to get on to your PR person for advice!
Was it Ford you worked for, and if it was do you know Keith Cheshire?
Geoff
|
|
|
|
|
|
Rank: Guest
|
Posted By Francis MSc MIOSH RSP
(Just to let people know, there is a consultation document out at the moment entitled "Review and evaluation of the effectiveness of the ...First-Aid Regulations 1981".)
|
|
|
|
|
|
You cannot post new topics in this forum.
You cannot reply to topics in this forum.
You cannot delete your posts in this forum.
You cannot edit your posts in this forum.
You cannot create polls in this forum.
You cannot vote in polls in this forum.