Re: Health and Safety Advisor

On 2 May, 00:30, Paul Harris <nos...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
 So after reading all this can we agree that
in other words there is no legislation saying we must comply and there
is no legal requirement requiring us to comply but they consider that it
would be good practice if we were to do so.

Seems to be a reasonable summary of the situation.

Consider the first part of the answer gives to the question as to
whether H&S stuff applies to volunteers.

"Does Health and Safety legislation apply to volunteers working for
charities?

Where any organisation has at least one paid employee, it is
considered to be an 'employer' for the purposes of the HSW Act and the
regulations made under it.

The Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999 (ISBN 0
7176 2488 9 - available from HSE Books) place a duty on both employers
and the self-employed to assess the risks to employees and anyone else
(e.g. voluntary workers, clients and customers) who may be affected by
the work activities being undertaken. As a result of this assessment,
appropriate preventive and protective measures have to be taken to
reduce the risks identified if they are not being adequately
controlled at present. Some of the regulations listed later describe
specific protective and preventive measures that have to be taken in
certain circumstances or when undertaking particular activities."

The bit they want you take notice of is that if there is just one
employee then the organisation is an employer and subject to H&S
stuff. Many people would read that and assume that if there is one
employee everyting the organisation does is subject to H&S stuff. I
recall some posters on here saying just that.

However, the HSE go on to say, that the regulations place a duty on
employers to risk assess everyone who may be 'affected' by the 'work
activities'. What exactly does this mean ?

Is it possible that the H&S stuff only applies to volunteer groups
when the volunteers are directly involved with the work being done by
the paid employees ? This would seem a resonable applicatgion of H&S
regulation.

What the HSE seem to want us to believe, is that if a volunteer group
employ at least one person, an admin assistant for instance, the H&S
stuff applies to ALL the activities they do.

If this is in fact true why do we not have a clear statement to this
effect ?

The H&S could say;

Where any organisation has at least one paid employee, it is
considered to be an 'employer' for the purposes of the HSW Act and the
regulations made under it, H&S regulations then apply to all
activities carried by the paid workers or volunteers or involving
customers of that organisation.

But they dont.





.

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