Crossroad Health & Safety Systems
Charfield Barns Office Park
Wotton Road
Charfield
Gloucestershire,
GL12 8SP
Telephone: 01453 845108
Fax: 08700 941122
E-mail: info@safetycrossroad.com
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| Frequently Asked Questions |
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| Because health and safety at work is so important, there are rules, which require all of us not to put ourselves or others in danger. The law is also there to protect the public from workplace dangers.
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| Inspectors from the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) or your local authority. For example:
HSE at factories, farms and building sites; local authorities in offices, shops, hotels and catering, and leisure activities.
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| They visit workplaces to check that people are sticking to the rules. They investigate some accidents and complaints but mainly they help you to understand what you need to do. They enforce only when something is seriously wrong. The following leaflet provides more information ‘What to expect when a health and safety inspector calls”.
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| No. HSE operates a confidential telephone information service called InfoLine, which is open Mon-Fri between 8am and 6pm. You can contact InfoLine by telephone 08701 545500 or fax 02920 859260, or e mail - hseinformationservices@natbrit.com. Alternatively you can write to HSE Information Services, Caerphilly Business Park, Caerphilly CF83 3GG.
We also have Workplace Contact Officers (WCOs) who can visit your business to provide you with information, guidance and advice. They also collect information about your business which will be used solely by HSE in any further contact with you. WCOs are not health and safety inspectors, they will not give advice on technical matters or express an opinion on compliance with the law. You may find the following leaflet useful 'What to expect when a WCO calls', WCOVL100.
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| If you are a new business you will need to register either with the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) or your Local Authority - depending on the sort of business you have. Broadly speaking, you should register with:
• the HSE by completing form F9 (notice of factory occupation); or
• your Local Authority by completing form OSR1 (notice of employment of persons in office, shop or certain railway premises. This includes catering establishments, staff canteens, fuel storage depots).
The definition of a factory is pretty wide-ranging, and covers most businesses where things are made, altered, adapted, repaired, decorated, finished, cleaned or demolished: or where people are employed in manual labour. Places where animals are slaughtered or held awaiting slaughter are also covered.
If you work with certain hazardous substances, such as asbestos or explosives, or in a hazardous industry such as construction or diving, you may also need to apply for a licence before your business starts to operate; or notify HSE or your Local Authority that you are starting certain specific activities. If you are already operating a business, you may also need to notify HSE or your Local Authority if you start certain specific activities.
Most farms will need to register but if in doubt please contact the HSE Infoline who will be able to advise you (08701 545500).
If you are unsure whether you need to register or notify HSE or your Local Authority about the type of work you are doing, contact HSE’s InfoLine on 08701 545500 or the Environmental Health Department of your Local Authority.
• Helpful Flowchart
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| Yes, it's the law if you employ anyone - and you should display the certificate in the workplace. See the free leaflet Employers’ Liability Compulsory Insurance Act 1969. A guide for employers HSE40 and Employers Liability (Compulsory Insurance) Act 1969 - a guide for employees and their representatives HSE 39.
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| Yes, the health and safety law poster (ISBN 0 7176 2493 5) if you employ anyone. Alternatively you can provide your employees with individual copies of the same information in a leaflet called ‘Your Health and Safety - a guide for workers’. The poster and leaflet are available from HSE Books.
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| Yes, and other incidents. Do you know which accidents and ill health cases to report, including who should do it, when and how? Employers, the self-employed and people in control of work premises all have duties.
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| A health and safety policy means the health and safety arrangements ie. the effective planning, organisation, control, monitoring and review of the preventative and protective measures. If there are 5 or more employees these arrangements must be recorded. If there are less than 5 employees the appropriate arrangements still need to be in place.
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| A hazard means anything that can cause harm (e.g. chemicals, electricity, working at height, machinery, etc).
Risk is the chance, high or low, that somebody will be harmed by the hazard.
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| If you hire agency workers, you must tell the employment business (agency) hiring them to you about risks to the worker’s health and safety and steps you have taken to control them; any necessary legal or professional qualifications or skills; and any necessary health surveillance. The employment business/agency should pass this information on to the worker in a way that he/she can clearly understand, and you must ensure the worker has received and understood it.
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| Personal protective equipment is to be supplied and used at work wherever there are risks to health and safety that cannot be adequately controlled in other ways. The following leaflets will provide more information:
• A short guide to the Personal Protective Equipment at Work Regulations 1992 INDG174
• Selection of suitable respiratory protective equipment for work with asbestos INDG288
• Selecting protective gloves for work with chemicals INDG330
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| Wherever there is a risk that has not been avoided or controlled by other means eg by engineering controls and safe systems of work employers are required to provide specific safety signs. Where a safety sign would not help to reduce that risk, or where the risk is not significant, there is no need to provide a sign. Specific information is available in leaflet ‘Signpost to The Health and Safety (Safety Signs and Signals) Regulations 1996’ INDG184L.
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| It is the employer’s duty to assess risks to lone workers and take steps to avoid or control risk where necessary. Employees have responsibility to take reasonable care of themselves and other people affected by their work and to co-operate with their employers in meeting their legal requirements. More information is available in ‘Working alone in safety - controlling the risks of solitary work’ INDG73(rev).
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| Most of the Regulations made under the Health and Safety at Work Act apply to homeworkers as well as to employees working at an employer’s workplace. Employers are required to do a risk assessment of the work activities carried out by homeworkers. More information is available in ‘Homeworking - Guidance for employers and employees on health and safety’ INDG226.
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| There are 3.7 million businesses in the UK, 99% of these have fewer than 50 employees.
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| We use the European definitions, which are also used by the Small Business Service as follows:
Micro business: 0 - 9 employees
Small business: 0 - 49 employees (includes micro)
Medium business: 50 - 249 employees
Large business: over 250 employees
A medium sized company must satisfy at least two of the following criteria:
• A turnover of not more than £11.2 million
• A balance sheet total of not more than £5.6 million
• Not more than 250 employees
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| Statistics from the manufacturing sector suggest that the rate of fatal and amputation injury in small workplaces (less than 50 employees) is double those in large workplaces (200 or more employees).
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| The HSE statistics webpages contain these details.
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| HSE has designed a Ready Reckoner particularly to help small and medium-sized businesses calculate the cost of accidents. It comes as both a free leaflet and as an interactive web site. The Ready Reckoner explains the associated costs of accidents and ill health at work, it will help you to work out how much your firm might be losing, and gives advice on how to avoid such costs. It also includes real-life case studies showing costs to firms that have suffered financially as a result of poor health and safety performance.
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| Preventing people from being harmed by work or becoming ill by taking the right precautions - and providing a satisfactory working environment.
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| Yes to all businesses, however small; also to the self-employed and to employees.
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Controlling dangers at work is no different from tackling any other task - recognising the problem, knowing enough about it, deciding what to do and putting the solution into practice. Click here to take you to the section on ‘Getting Started’.
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HSE Press Release released on Wednesday 9th April 2008, revealed early unvalidated figures from the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) suggest that around 69 construction workers were killed in 2007/08. This points to a 10% improvement on the previous yea ...
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A Bristol college must pay £32,000 in fines and costs after a tutor was badly burned when a bottle of concentrated nitric acid exploded on his desk. ...
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Health and Safety Executive inspectors issued 21 prohibition notices in the south-west this week after visits to refurbishment and conversion building sites. ...
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Safety training for Site Supervisors to become mandatory ...
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