Posted By Bob Youel

Safety 'statement' or H&Safety policy?

The statements for some international giants are one page long! With appropriate policies etc thereafter

Posted By Schui
Seamus

its not the quantity its the quality that matters

make sure all the content is covered as per 2005 Act and all the risks assessed the HSA has a document you can download for free or 11 Euro for hard copy its calle Guidelines on Risk Assessments and Safety Statements

Hope this helps

Posted By Seamus O Sullivan
Hi everyone
Thanks for the replies.
Seamus

Posted By Philip McAleenan
Dear all.

It’s always good to refer to the specific regulation in order to understand what the legal requirements are. Seamus has stated that the carpenter has no employees. Section 20 is reproduced below.

20.—(1) Every employer shall prepare, or cause to be prepared, a written statement (to be known and referred to in this Act as a “safety statement”), based on the identification of the hazards and the risk assessment carried out under section 19, specifying the manner in which the safety, health and welfare at work of his or her employees shall be secured and managed.


It refers to the legal requirement for an “employer” to have a written safety statement. S20 doesn’t apply to Seamus’s client.

In all other respects, size doesn’t matter; it is the content that is important. S20.-(2) specifies what the content should include.

Regards, Philip

Posted By Philip McAleenan
Margaret,

Thank you for your response. To my mind, the use of the term “where appropriate” changes the section from an absolute requirement for the self-employed person to regard himself as an employer to one where he must make a judgement as to whether the circumstances warrant such a conflation.

A function of the safety statement is to communicate. Communication (in whatever form it takes) requires at least two individuals, one to transmit information, the other to receive it.

If section 7 defines the self-employer person as being both the employer and the employee, and in reality both those identities are embodied in a single individual, then communication is instantaneous. The moment one identity considers a point the other is aware of it. The beauty is that the communication is perfect; there is no misunderstanding between the two identities as there would be if they where two separate physical bodies.

Therefore in these circumstances the self-employed person may rightly judge inappropriate the necessity to prepare a written safety statement. There may be other circumstances in which the preparation of a written communication is appropriate, and these must be judged by the self-employed person on the basis of the facts.

The HSA is the enforcement authority and their advice is not to be taken lightly. However they are an enforcement body and they can only apply the law as it is written in either statute or case law. Whilst their interpretation of the law is helpful, where there is ambiguity or disagreement on how to interpret it the final arbiter is the court and they must persuade the court as to the correctness of their particular interpretation. So to would the other party to the proceedings in respect of his/her interpretation.

In the real world, and in respect of Seamus’ original question this debate is academic as his client already has a safety statement prepared, (though Seamus as lawturor I am sure that you appreciate the niceties of the argument). To my mind the size is unimportant, and, possibly for the reasons I have said, it is unread because the author and the reader are one and the same person. As to whether the statement is a fiction, that is a matter between Seamus and his client, though I suspect that it was a tongue in cheek reference to its size rather than its content. So, if the content is fine, why change it?

Anyhow, Margaret, a wee bit of a debate on a Saturday morning is not a bad way to start the weekend,

Regards, Philip

Posted By Seamus O Sullivan
Hi everyone,
yes it apears a consultant made some money from this guy( but this guy is not complaining about this, he was happy with the service).But i must say the statement was a good one, if it was followed there would never be an accident.

I have just counted the pages, it is 77 pages in total.

Yes this guy needs a safety statement for his insurance company. This is why he ever bothered with one. I would guess 2/3 of small business do not have a safety statement here.(it could even be more than 2/3)

Now my main query is how large should the safety statement be. When will it be too small.
What grounds will someone have for saying it is not sufficient?

my understanding of a safety statement is there must be .....
a policy,
a section on responsibitities,
a risk assessment covering the main risks, with controls, and do not have to cover the trivial things, Am I correct here????
a bullying policy if there are employees(not relevant here).


So can anyone please suggest grounds for someone rejecting a safety statement.
My guess is too old, not being signed,major obvious risks not being addressed,not being relevant to the business, also who can reject a safety statement? a safety officer or who?

Thanks for all the replies

Seamus

Posted By Rich T
Actually - according to Regulation 20 (Safety Statements), subsection (8) "It shall be sufficient compliance with this section by an employer employing 3 or less employees to observe the terms of a code of practice, if any, relating to safety statements which applies to the class of employment covering the type of work activity carried on by the employer."

I would take this to mean they may may not need a statement at all - they just observe the relevant codes of practice (assuming that any exist for his trade).