Posted By Robert Randall
The employer's responsibilies are dictated not by the name that you give to the activitiers that you pursue but by the relationship between you and your employer.

If you are carrying out activities that benefit your employer and are part of his undertaking it makes no difference whatever if you are paid for those activities or not. It is still work for an employer and he has to comply with all of the requirements of Health and Safety legislation.

Incidentally he would have to comply for the first minute and the last even if the foregoing was not true. In complying for those time periods he would have to do all that is necessary anyway, i.e. provide safe work equipment, a safe place of work, safe access and egress to that place of work, safety in transport, storage and use of hazardous substances, information training instruction and supervision etc. There could be no advantage whatever in the scheme that you have apparently thought up as a potential loophole.

Posted By ChrisinMalta
Also let's not forget s3 of HASWA - "duties to people other than employees".
Chris

Posted By AlB
Obviously you (or your employer) wants to avoid the "burden of H&S" (or insurance cover) by going down this (in my opinion hair-brained) approach.

But imagine, even if the above was not true, and you, or one of your colleagues, or an innocent memeber of the public was to be severely injured or killed in light of this "hobby", then it may not be such a good idea. Remember - H&S is not intended to be a paperchase and an unnecesary burden - its about analysing the risk and conrolling them. That is quite straightforward. But to not analyse and control the risk you would be increasing your chances of sustaining a serious or fatal injury - of course, if you know what you are doing and you do the risk assessment by default, then in essence you are doing what you intend not to do in the first place - taking H&S into consideration!!!

And if this idea is a way to alleviate some of the insurance burden, then consider the risks involved if anything does go wrong and there is no cover to protect you from the cost.........

Posted By Bob Shillabeer
Hang on a bit here, work is not the question here. You undertake an activity under the control of the employer (paid or unpaid) therefore the whole gambit of H&S law applies. Working for oneself is not a get out either as if you do work for yourself you still have responsibility for everything you do not only for your safety but for others who may be affected. It is no good coming up with not do cleverly disguised ways of getting out of the responsibility as the H&S at Work Act has dealt with this sort of practice before and won.