Morning all, I have a meeting today with one of our Directors to discuss the future structure of H&S within the workplace and I think I know what their proposal is going to be... We're a multi site production operation and employ between 100 and 300 people at each site; I think the Directors medium to long term aim is to make the site managers responsible for the day-to-day management of H&S at each site (accident investigation, risk assessment etc). From my own experience this only works if there is still someone in a H&S Officer (for example) position at each site pulling the strings and coordinating activities. Otherwise as soon as the pressure gets applied from a production perspective, safety paperwork is the first thing that gets sacrificed. I'm going to argue that there still needs to be someone in a H&S position at each site, even if its of a lower qualification level and supported by myself, but I would welcome the views and experiences of others. Thanks

FB, you're right to consider this as a potential issue as the degree of responsibility taken on by line managers will be dependant on the wider culture within your organisation. The danger with the proposed path your company is taking is that managers will suddenly be given safety responsibilities without having a reasonable understanding of what those responsibilities include. Du Pont has an almost legendary reputation when it comes of H&S but the path to being able to have a sustainable safety organisation on that par would have been the result of a lot of work to develop the foundation so that they could rely on their management organisation. Manager's should have the responsibility that you think will be recomended anyway, the real question is what would be needed to get from where you are now to a point where that system would work effectively.

ETA: could this not be looked as evolution rather than devolution?!

I inspect premises under HASAW and this rarely works. Firstly a suitable level of health and safety training is required, which is not usually the case - if the site manager had the training he/she would probably be practising H&S! Secondly, employers forget that when they delegate responsibilities they need to ensure that the person has the TIME to do the task, this never happens. Site managers are expected to 'fit it in'. Thirdly sufficient audits are required to ensure all persons with responsibilities are undertaking them adequately, if the responsibility of H&S has been passed to the site managers, it is usual to reduce the number of H&S managers, as a result there is not enough left to audit. It is usually a downhill process from here, unfortunately .

Jeez, what world do you live in? Obviously one where text book models of H&S management MUST be adhered to and health and safety could only ever be effectively managed by health and safety professionals. So back in the real world. In answer to the original post, my advice would be that if change is going to happen then it is going to happen. Better to compromise and have an input into those changes than refuse to accept any changes and consequentially end up being left out of the process altogether. Health and safety can effectively be managed at a site level by a non-health and safety professional as long as they understand what is expected of them. In fact one could argue that is better that someone understands the production pressures and can therefore accommodate them. In my experience there are too many in-house (and external) health and safety professionals who refuse to see the importance of a productive work force sticking doggedly to the mantra that health and safety is THE most important thing. It's not. Because if the company doesn't make money there will be no business. There has to be a balance. So that's my advice. Help find a balance.

JUST??? It's amazing how many people think it's easy to JUST become a consultant.