Hi all, This may sound like a bit of a stupid question, so apologies in advance :) Are the rules regarding H&S in Universities the same as those that are applied to schools, in the sense that I am aware the H&S at work does not cover the following in schools: Promoting the welfare and wellbeing of pupils Communicable diseases Behaviour and discipline of pupils Criminal record checks Food hygiene Driving/ licensing of school minibus drivers Use of seat belts on buses Waste and pollution control Are the any differences for Universities?, if so does anyone have any guidance,documents,further reading etc. In essence I am look for any help/advice that can be given with regard to managing H&S at a Uni as its not an environment I have much experience in.

I think you have not had any replies because we are not too clear about the question. The things that you list: Promoting the welfare and wellbeing of pupils, Communicable diseases…Criminal record checks etc might not be included in anybody’s remit as H&S (not just in education) on the other hand they might be as H&S bods tend to get drawn into anything resembling compliance -hence in some places they do CRB checks, food safety etc. So a university H&s bod might do this stuff or might not, it just depends on how that institution wants to run the show. There is no centrally issues guidance anywhere telling people what a H&S person does for a particular type employer.

I worked in a very high-tech university for 16 years. Universities are very different from schools. The inhabitants are adults, and they are expected to be in the transition phase from complete dependency to complete independence, which can be tricky. The biggest concern could be research, which is by definition doing something that no-one did before. Sometimes it is incremental, so you can extrapolate with a degree of accuracy about what might happen/could go wrong. Sometimes it is revolutionary, in which case you need a very good grasp of science and engineering to do a decent risk assessment. You often need to work things out from first principles. The responsibilities that will fall under the remit of the H&S person are defined by the organisation, as already mentioned above.