Posted By grumpy
Where (specifically stated) is the legal requirement that an organisation must have competent assistance in health and safety?

Posted By Tim
Health and safety assistance
7. - (1) Every employer shall, subject to paragraphs (6) and (7), appoint one or more
competent persons to assist him in undertaking the measures he needs to take to comply
with the requirements and prohibitions imposed upon him by or under the relevant
statutory provisions and by Part II of the Fire Precautions (Workplace) Regulations 1997.
(2) Where an employer appoints persons in accordance with paragraph (1), he shall
make arrangements for ensuring adequate co-operation between them.
(3) The employer shall ensure that the number of persons appointed under paragraph
(1), the time available for them to fulfil their functions and the means at their disposal are
adequate having regard to the size of his undertaking, the risks to which his employees are
exposed and the distribution of those risks throughout the undertaking.
(4) The employer shall ensure that -
(a) any person appointed by him in accordance with paragraph (1) who is not in his
employment -
(i) is informed of the factors known by him to affect, or suspected by him of
affecting, the health and safety of any other person who may be affected by
the conduct of his undertaking, and
(ii) has access to the information referred to in regulation 10; and
(b) any person appointed by him in accordance with paragraph (1) is given such
information about any person working in his undertaking who is -
(i) employed by him under a fixed-term contract of employment, or
(ii) employed in an employment business,
as is necessary to enable that person properly to carry out the function specified in
that paragraph.
(5) A person shall be regarded as competent for the purposes of paragraphs (1) and (8)
where he has sufficient training and experience or knowledge and other qualities to enable
him properly to assist in undertaking the measures referred to in paragraph (1).
(6) Paragraph (1) shall not apply to a self-employed employer who is not in partnership
with any other person where he has sufficient training and experience or knowledge and
other qualities properly to undertake the measures referred to in that paragraph himself.
(7) Paragraph (1) shall not apply to individuals who are employers and who are together
carrying on business in partnership where at least one of the individuals concerned has
sufficient training and experience or knowledge and other qualities -
(a) properly to undertake the measures he needs to take to comply with the
requirements and prohibitions imposed upon him by or under the relevant statutory
provisions; and
(b) properly to assist his fellow partners in undertaking the measures they need to
take to comply with the requirements and prohibitions imposed upon them by or
under the relevant statutory provisions.
(8) Where there is a competent person in the employer's employment, that person shall
be appointed for the purposes of paragraph (1) in preference to a competent person not in
his employment.