Posted By Adrian Plimmer Hi everyone. Just a query with regards titles of Safety Committees. We are a non union company, and our new health and safety manager has infomred us that the H and S Committee cant be titled as such because of non union involvement. It can only be called a H and S meeting. Is this true. What regulation does it come under. Safety representatives and safety committees Third edition doesnt say anything about this? Cheers Adrian Plimmer

Posted By Kenny McGillivray Adrian Your manager should be pleased your people have taken the interest they have and should be working with you all to raise the profile of Health & Safety no matter what you call those sitting round the table. Good luck and call it the Health & Safety Committeee and be proud of it!! regards Kenny

Posted By Kate Graham The non-unionised firm where I work has a safety committee (what else would you call it? safety meeting doesn't work, because you can't talk about "members of the safety meeting", it doesn't make sense) and yes, we even call the reps "safety reps". Why on earth would there be a law against it?

Posted By Laurie Before I'd even read a response, my thought was "Rubbish"! Laurie

Posted By Gilly Margrave Not this old (horse) chestnut again. TUs usually object if the ter "Safety Committee" (as opposed to Health & Safety Committee) is used as it can cause confusion with relation to SRSC Regs. "Safety Rep" is also specifically TU. BUT!! In non-ionised workplaces there is still a duty to consult the workers. This is often done through "Representatives of Employee Safety" which are sort of Safety Reps Lite with fewer rights in terms of training, inspection and investigation. By all means call your committee a "Health & Safety Committee" - personally I'd chuck "Welfare" into the mix as well. If I wanted something to sound interesting and all-inclusive rather than a load of shiny bums on seats I'd probably call it a "Health, Safety and Welfare Forum" and this from that ultimate shiny bum on a seat a TU Branch Safety Officer (and Safety Rep). Anyway good luck in your endeavours. Gilly

Posted By Gilly Margrave Has anyone noticed there are two threads going off one question here? Is it a cunning plot? Gilly

Posted By Gilly Margrave Merv, I always suspected the "W" in HASaWA stood for "Why for" or "Whatever". Seems I was right. Gilly

Posted By Hilary Charlton Utter claptrap of course. A committee is a body of persons appointed for a specific function by and usually out of a larger body. Ergo, your health and safety committee is a body appointed by the company to look after the specific functions of health and safety. I am very proud of our H&S Committee which has now been running with some of the same members for over 12 years - unfortunately, I am one of these members (need to go and get a life!). We are non unionised and calling it an H&S Committee has never caused us a problem. Hilary

Posted By Stuart Nagle Hi, Hillary. I understand that Boards usually appoint committees....Committees appoint sub-committees and of course steering groups. I belive the term 'committee' has its roots in the formation of an 'elected body' and hence perhaps the misinterpretation of the term (as generally used nowadays) as meaning a group of (elected) officials such as in a unionised environment. Irrespective of the fact that the question has been raised concerning a non-unionised environment, there would be no harm in holding an election for places on a H&S Committee if practicable, it may even have a beneficial effect on the workforce by involving them in the process and assisting in raising the profile of health and safety - no bad thing. There is not, so far as I can find out, any bar to having a health and safety 'committee' irrespective of union involvment. A safety 'committee', even in a unionised environment is likely only exist if either requested by elected union officals representing the workforce or if 'created' by the employer. In some cases in my experience, employers in such circumstances like to 'cherry-pick' members onto a committee of their making so as to ensure that there are no 'trouble-makers' and management are assured of a non-confrontational passage during meetings. Whilst this may have it's own perculiar merits, this would seem to be a committee by proxy and a bit of a toothless wonder. Often in such circumstances, collegues in the workforce may come to resent committee 'members' where action is slow, not taken, or where management have a 'hold' and not much seems to happen except the production of bland minutes appearing on notice boards. This then often has a detrimental effect on health and safety by lowering the committees value in the eyes of the workforce, the committee being judged as management flunkies... Stuart

Posted By David A Jones Adrian, Your manager isn't MarkSMark by any chance is he?

Posted By Liam Nolan Hi, I would take a differant angle to your problem. What level was the guy promoted to H&S Manager from? Is he more concerned with ingraciating himself with Management than giving impartial advice? I must admit, I am not well up on the NEBOSH levels that you go through in the UK (I am in Ireland). But is the quick route NEBOSH sufficent to make him a competent person for the role of H&S Manager? Is he afraid to rock the boat with Management - re they might get nervous if a committee is formed (connotations of Union perhaps?) Maybe I just have a conspiricy theory mind? Liam

Posted By fats van den raad No muddled thinking mate, There is NO law that says you can only call a gathering a safety committee if it consists of union elected members. Your H&S manager has got it wrong in more ways than one, firstly on a factual basis, and secondly on motivational basis, as he should (as H&S manager) be more concerned with higher priority safety issues than be bothered about what the safty committee is called.

Posted By Jonathan Breeze Adrian, I can't see the muddled thinking here either. If it looks like a duck & quacks like a duck... then it's a duck! I understood Gilly's point to be that some TU's are unhappy with the term for Political reasons rather than Legal reasons (some TU safety reps might not like sitting on the same committee as untrained non-union reps). As such is not really off side. Perhaps the lecturer was also making the same point. But as you are totally non-unionised I do not forsee this issue arising. I would agree with Heather that there are probably far bigger issues that need to be dealt with by your H&S Manager.

Posted By Jim Mc Nally Adrian I think from the responses that it seems clear that your guy is wrong in his assertion. However, on reading through this, he may be getting mixed up between the roles of the elected safety reps and the appointed management rep (for non union shops). I think he is trying to draw a clear distinction which I think really doesn't happen in companies.

Posted By Stuart Nagle Well done Maggie. At last someone has read between the lines... I wondered how long it was going to take, and I agree. Jonathon Breeze also hit the nail on the head when he mentioned training. there may well be a mute recognition by management in this instance that perhaps none of the members of a 'committee' (being a non unionised environment) may have had any training in health and safety, so what better way of avoiding all those nasty little costs than to poo poo the idea and leaving the H&S Manager to try and invent some kind of excuse not to proceed!! This is beginmning to sound more and more like a management ploy to avoid what they percieve is a costly exercise rather than a beneficial opportunity for progress.... Sounds like a conspiracy theory to me.... Stuart