Posted By Paulo Dinis Good day ! I´ve just checked this website : http://ec.europa.eu/inte...gprofs/dsp_bycountry.cfm and find out that H&S Officer / Manager professions are not regulated in UK. That was a surprise for me, but that might explain why so many professional system´s, titles and "levels" are used in UK. You can see that few european state members have regulated the acess to H&S professions, for example Portugal and Spain have national legislation. Has any one tried to obtain professional recognition from one state member to another ? Do you considerer that H&S related professions can be considered as "highly mobile" within the European market ? Paulo Dinis H&S Manager ( not sure i use correctly this "title" ) Portugal

Posted By Philby' Paulo, very interesting, if as you intimating, and does apear to be so, that as memebers of the EU, we are at liberty to ply our trade wherever and whenever within our borders, how are we able to in those member states where regulation and legal registration is mandatory (dependant on acceptance of prescribed levels of competence/qualification). One of the guys I did my NEBOSH Dip with often went out to Portrugal to one of his companies sites, but never mentioned any of this. I've emailed my brother in the Chech Republic who intimates that, when they were setting up aproduction unit out there, and another in Russia, it was more a case of keeping all sides 'happy' with what was going on and including some members of local authority/administartion on the board. As for the legal position, I await his response as to what happens out there.... Philby'

Posted By Paulo Dinis I´m very glad this topic capture your attention. Extracted from the website main page mentioned early. "A profession is said to be regulated when access to it is subject by legal, regulatory or administrative provisions to the possession of a specific qualification. Each country is responsible for providing and updating its own information. The lists of regulated professions for the 10 new Member States, Switzerland and those regulated under Directive 1999/42/CE are still being compiled and will only be completed over the coming months" So let´s do a quick "role playing", hope you don´t get offended by this "exercise". Let´s imagine Max Bancroft and Philby are from UK Let´s imagine Kieran J Duignan is from France. Let´s imagine is from Portugal, well no need to imagine i am :) In these scenario all of them are fluent in English, French and Portuguese so no language barrier exists. Max Bancroft, Philby, Kieran J Duignan and Paulo Dinis are all working as H&S Officers (not the same qualification / competence but they practice the same job). H&S is based on international concept´s, methods and risk control is the same everywhere etc but as expected local regulation / normalization / standard´s differs. Max Bancroft and Philby receives an irrefutable professional challenge to work in a site based in European State Member - Portugal. Kieran J Duignan receives an irrefutable professional challenge to work in a site based in European State Member - United Kingdom. Paulo Dinis receives an irrefutable professional challenge to work in a site based in European State Member - France Kieran J Duignan can "move" from France to UK and access to H&S Officer profession since it´s not regulated in UK. He can start working the next day. Paulo Dinis can "move" from Portugal to France and acess to H&S Officer profession since it´s not regulated in France, therefore start working the next day. Max Bancroft and Philby can´t work as H&S Officer in Portugal due to the fact the profession is regulated in Portugal. In order to work in Portugal you need to have autorization from Portuguese authorities http://www.ishst.pt/ and start your recognizion process. Best case scenario you start working somewhere in 03 months to 08 months untill the autorization is delivered. According to Portuguese national legislation your work contract ( of course if hired as H&S Officer ) is not valid if you don´t have the legal autorization to do so. That fact arrised from the regulation status for the profession in Portugal. Same procedures aplies if you work in Spain since it´s also regulated there. hummmm As Philby´ mentioned earlier i am intimating you ( had to check the dictionary for that word ). Is the commom market a paradox ? Worker´s freedom of movement ? According to european statistic only 01 % of work force is mobile in the european market. We might have the same european legislation ( with national specificities ) but we can´t really be that mobile can we ? I look forward for the Chech Republic follow up on this matter.

Posted By Hazel Harvey Max, Thanks for the information regarding the UK list of recognised professions. I am already on the case for this one. In addition to this the European Network of Safety Practitioner Oraganisations (ENSHPO)is working together to produce a central register of qualifications etc. that can be recognised across Europe. This is to allow for this cross-border practice. I am due to attend a meeting next month regarding this so it is a bit of watch this space. The UK does have a different model of recognisisng professional status from other EU member states as the 'Chartered Body' approach is a traditional one developed specifically here in the UK. Although not regulated by statute in a similar way to say the medical professions the 'Chartered' designation does carry a similar kudos and does appear to be recognised in the recently issued document. I'll keep you posted. Hazel Harvey Director of Professional Affairs

Posted By Philby' Paulo, ref 'I look forward for the Chech Republic follow up on this matter'... little brother says they are moving towards EU membership and are, therefore, looking at how existing H&S law fits with EU and other member states....as regards mobility, from his experience and that of collegues from other 'foreign firms', apparantly there is a Japanese/european plant up the road, it seems they all have host nation/worker and parent company representatives on committes that deal with quality/production/health and safety/personnel issues but most guidance comes from the parent company... having said all that, and it doesn't fully answer the mobility issue, I visit Germany quite often, sort of wifes business/my pleasure, and am invited to diferent corporate/authority events...at a chance meeting/introduction I stated that I wouldn't mind living in Germany to which I was offered some associate work...whether that was the rather nice lager talking or not, I politely declined but did have a good conversation on compartives, before moving onto music, art, culture etc. Philby'