Workplace Health Project An Expensive Failure

A multi-million pound government funded project designed to provide advice on workplace health issues to small and medium-sized firms is failing dramatically in achieving this goal, with almost 9 out of 10 calls received not workplace health-related.

Workplace Health Connect, launched in February 2006 as a semi-detached offshoot of the Health and Safety Executive, quickly attracted criticism. HSE chief executive Geoffrey Podger told a May 2006 Select Committee the project "had a problem in relation to take up".

An evaluation four months into the project found only seven per cent of calls were on workplace health issues, the remainder on safety issues already catered for by HSE awareness advisers and the HSE Infoline.

Now an Institution for Employment Studies evaluation of WHC's first 16 months in operation has found 'the data demonstrates that the adviceline is primarily of interest to employers as a source of advice about safety related matters, although about 11 per cent of callers did ring with a specific health enquiry.' Advisers could only introduce health issues with callers requesting information on other issues in just over 15 per cent of cases. The report notes 'overall call levels to the adviceline remain well below the initial targets.' Just over 9,000 calls were received in the evaluation period, from February 2006 to May 2007, or about 20 calls a day. This suggests just a couple of calls each day were on a workplace health issues, WHC's key purpose.

Jawad Qasrawi, manager of the two-person health and safety campaigning magazine Hazards, commented: "We answer more health-based queries before breakfast, and we have no budget for advice work. Compared to primary care based occupational health projects and workers' health and safety advice centres like Greater Manchester Hazards Centre, Workplace Health Connect is a multi-million pound disaster and a costly flop. This money could be better targeted and much better used."

Source: TUC Risks

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