Afternoon, I'm a member of the Charities Safety Group and they've recently asked HSE for clarification about the RIDDOR status of volunteers. This is what came back: 'For the purposes of reporting under RIDDOR a worker would be a person under a contract of employment. As this is unlikely to be the case for most volunteers they should be classed as members of the public when it comes to reporting.' I have two concerns about this; first of all RIDDOR doesn't actually refer to 'worker', instead it talks about 'person at work'. Now this might sound pedantic, but since UK law is largely about words I'm a bit concerned when the regulator uses terms that aren't in the regulations to provide advice about them. Second, it flies in the face of advice I have received in the past, and I'm left wondering when, or whether, this actually changed. Any comments? What do others think? John

The response you've got mirrors what's on the HSE website: http://www.hse.gov.uk/contact/faqs/charities.htm Seems sensible to me. Provided you report in good faith, I very much doubt the HSE would come back and bite about the status of the IP.

I seem to be in a minority here. However, as I say HSE have in the past said clearly that volunteers are workers for the purposes of RIDDOR (in response to queries on my part), and there is case law that says that volunteers are people at work with regard to general duties under HASAWA (r v Prince's Trust for example). Hence my feeling that this is a change, and that it is inconsistent with the way that courts have viewed volunteers, John

I agree this looks like a change - most charities are clearly businesses, look at a charity shop where there is probably at least 1 employee and a number of volunteers. In the past I believe the advice was could you do the job without the volunteers or would you have to employ someone, if you have to employ someone then treat them like a employee. The web link appears to change that completely - so do we also assume that written risk assessments etc are not needed, I guess we have to. Chris thanks for supplying the link.

quote=Brian Hagyard]The web link appears to change that completely - so do we also assume that written risk assessments etc are not needed, I guess we have to. .

No because you still have a duty under 3(1) for non employees and when you do your risk assessment is should cover everyone who many be affected, so a RA should still cover them but it seems not RIDDOR unless as MoP. There seems to be more categories of people from that link. Employee, Self Employed, Worker and Volunteer. Not sure I have go my head around the difference between Employee, worker and Volunteer. Ok employee is paid, but worker v Volunteer ? I always thought this was the Master / Servant test. As a volunteer does what is requested then they are a servant. The devil in me - Employer -ok Joe I will now pay you your weeks wage for working just one hour a week. However before working that hour you must volunteer for 36 unpaid hours. :o)

Hay I didn't write that page :0) and yes I agree there seems to be a change. Personally I think volunteer or not if you are directing their actions then they should be treated as would an employee in all things ( including RIDDOR). Oddly and main reason for this post I tried to look up the Princes Trust case and there seemed to be a little confusion over which section they were prosecuted against s2 or s3. You may have better access to records than me, but worth checking. To be honest as you say RIDDOR is neither here nor there, a investigation and remedial actions would be undertaken regardless.

Bob, helpful as always. Just to be clear here, and to follow up on what Bob says, my context with volunteers is 17,000 or so of them in an organisation with over 4,000 paid staff and a turnover of several hundred million a year (and yes, most of that money does get spent on our charitable purposes!). Our volunteers drive emergency vehicles, operate 7.5 tonne communications vehicles, deliver first aid and personal social care services, wade through swollen rivers and all sorts of stuff. They're not running a cake stall (well, some of them are but that's not the point). Without them we would not be able to discharge our undertaking. HSE's comments seem to be based on the idea of purely voluntary organisations; well, there are many like us (RNLI, St John, Salvation Army, Sustrans to name but a few) who have armies of volunteers doing really quite heavy and sometimes hazardous work. As far as I am concerned our volunteers are 'people at work' even if not employees. And RIDDOR uses the former term, not the latter. Chris, sorry, didn't mean to shoot the messenger, but I happen to think HSE's policy wonks have got this one wrong, and that, as Bob says, it's complicated, John