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"Good Health and Safety, Good for Everyone" -Your Thoughts
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The Right Hon Chris Grayling MP, Minister of Employment with responsibilities for health and safety has announced a review of health and safety including an independent review of health and safety legislation.
A pdf. of the positioning statement can be found (midway down) on,
http://www.dwp.gov.uk/policy/health-and-safety/
Depending on your disposition (and employment) you might find this stiring stuff.
May I stimulate some discussion on this? your views on the general impact on health and safety management and on future employment within the profession is welcome.
Thanks for your thoughts, I'm sure it'll be an interesting read.
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Rank: Forum user
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Health and Safety legislation in this country is mainly sound, comprehensive and simple enough to implement. The lord young report, camerons speeches and this review is all just political posturing. What we all have to remember is that the legislation itself does not create red tape, the law does not tell you how to implement the rules just what they are. The red tape (forms etc) is created by the company itself as they feel that is the best way to comply.
A review into legislation will not find any real sources of 'red tape', as lord youngs report did not find any real issues with Health and Safety either.
What is annoying though is that we have had to endure a scope of people (business aligned or related) going over the health and safety world with a fine tooth comb like we are a misbehaving school child when there are other sectors in this country that are far more deserving of a detailed grilling (bankers?)
this DWP document starts with a statement that the UK has an enviable record in safety... exactly! we are good at safety so whats the problem here??? Lets face it this country doesnt have much to shout about achievement wise so its strange that the govt is attacking rather than championing a success story.
I would however like to see IOSH and the HSE go on the attack a bit more against some of the silly statements that the govt and its 'advisors' have come out with.
What I find somewhat ridiculous is that the DWP state that businesses are confused by H&S, its funny how they can manage complicated financial systems, be enterprising, take advantage of stock markets et al, but they struggle with the concept of putting a wet floor sign out when the floors been mopped... Call me cynical but the fact is that H&S can cost money and I cant help but feel that a bit of playing dumb is going on here in order to try to reduce the 'burden'
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Rank: Super forum user
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We've two or three posts going on this it would appear.
Reading through that latest Report, I note that this Government seeks to take credit for the 'new' "Health and Safety made Simple" resource. None of this is "new" and none of this arose out of LY Report, all of this first-level information was previously available on HSE website and had been for several years.
What HSE lacked then it still lacks now - the resource to market this information in conjunction with other Government Departments and Business Start-ups etc. New businesses get loads of info on tax, employment law, procurement, VAT etc - but little or nothing on H&S. Not fair to say SMEs are "burdened", most of them are probably blissfully ignorant - until something goes wrong!
As for the rest - same old political posturing and possibly some predetermined "recommendations" waiting in the background for later this year.
To expect a realistic comparison and review between the relevant EC Directives and all UK H&S Law (and presumably some comparison with what other member States have done) between now and Autumn 2011?! I don't think so.
Let's not forget the UK Legislation that's currently leaning the other way: Control of Asbestos Regs 2006 aren't compliant - it will be interesting to see the ride this gets through the current legislature.
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Rank: Forum user
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neilrimmer wrote:
I would however like to see IOSH and the HSE go on the attack a bit more against some of the silly statements that the govt and its 'advisors' have come out with.
Me too, Neil...someone needs to grow a backbone and say what they really think.
This article by David Mitchell rang a bell for me:
http://www.guardian.co.u...avid-cameron-bureaucrats
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Rank: Forum user
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Spot on chaps!
I fear this Government is only too willing to believe the nonsense some of our national daily papers pump out.
I personally know people who have been involved in serious incidents that have been portrayed as 'H&S gone mad', and have seen the damage it has done.
To make matters worse those same papers continue to reference the original shock horror headlines months after they were proved to be tosh - they are completely unrepentant about doing so.
As KevMac says - it would be good to see IOSH grow some backbone over this.
However, I fear that the HSE are too reliant on Government funding to make too much noise, they would risk being abolished altogether.
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Rank: Super forum user
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Personally, I'm getting a bit cheesed off with the same old rhetoric. Safety and deregulation has become a cheap political maelstrom, with which the Government is using to ingratiate itself with recession hit businesses.
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Rank: Super forum user
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I'm with Ray.
It seems like they didn't get the answer they wanted in the last review, so they're going to repeat the process until they get the answer they actually want.
Unless you consider the legal, moral and financial aspects holistically then you'll keep coming up with a skewed answer.
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Rank: Forum user
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RayRapp wrote:Personally, I'm getting a bit cheesed off with the same old rhetoric. Safety and deregulation has become a cheap political maelstrom, with which the Government is using to ingratiate itself with recession hit businesses.
I didnt vote them in (just for the record)
Did anyone?
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Rank: New forum user
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Any thoughts on the impact on future employment within the H&S profession? Thanks for the thoughts so far. I can't disagree with anything said.
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Rank: Super forum user
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Quote - "However, I fear that the HSE are too reliant on Government funding to make too much noise, they would risk being abolished altogether."
As a Charity, IOSH swallows up the donations made to it by the Charity Commission,therefore unlikely to challenge the hand that feeds them. To challenge with any venom could lead to a reduction in hand outs.
Jon
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Rank: Forum user
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Ah! Well spotted, John.
So vested interests mean that even professional bodies can't be relied upon to be the voice of sanity or concience.
Guess it's down to the unions to do the shouting then - it was ever thus.....
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Rank: Super forum user
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'I didnt vote them in (just for the record)
Did anyone?'
Well, someone did...
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