HSE Strategy Document Under Scrutiny

Hilda Palmer from Hazards reports from the first HSE consultation on their strategy which took place in Liverpool last week.

After a big fuss by Haz Cam about ensuring wider attendance by workers/safety reps/ victims families, and also queries as to whether these meetings were real consultation or just an invitation to sign up to the strategy which isn’t a strategy but a collection of goals, the HSE seems to have changed it’s mind and made the meetings part of a consultation process.  But we have been here many, many times before so no great expectations.

The first one was held in Liverpool on Thursday 8th January and John Bamford, Hilda Palmer, John Flanagan, Sue Bennett, Diane Jones and Steve Tombs attended as Hazards Campaigners. On registering they allocated participants to a table of like minded folk, so there was a Hazards Campaign table and two trade union tables out of 10 tables. We had circulated it widely via the NW TU Safety Reps Networks trying to get as many safety reps and union activists there, and there were probably about 25 from ‘our side of H&S’ out of 90 people and therefore 3 report backs expressing our views very strongly – Steve Tombs, Laurence Hunt UCATT and Derek Maylor CWU.

The programme – Welcome and presentation by Judith Hackit  - she introduced the affair by running through the strategy and the HSE goals for about 30 mins.

Table discussion for about 40 minutes, then report back from each table, then summing up by Judith Hackitt.  

Similar participants were put on each table plus a HSE person to facilitate – the Hazards Campaign table 10 had Judith Hackitt herself and Steve Tombs gave the report back.. Liz Snape a HSE Board Member from UNISON was on one of the TU tables and the newest HSE Board member David Gartside was about too. David Ashton ex NW Regional Director and new Director of HSE Enforcement was on table 1.

Please make you self known to any of the key HSE local and national people as a member of the Hazards Campaign as well as whatever local hats you are wearing.

In the Table Discussion the questions from the consultation were supposed to be used BUT most tables ours included ignored them and made key points which is a better idea as the questions blinker and constrict the discussion.  See the summary which Steve Tombs prepared and delivered from our discussion.

Key points to get across whenever you can in the context of the discussion:

• The real burden of poor H&S is that borne by the many made ill, injured and killed and their families NOT the one of employers to obey the law. Victims of workplace injuries and illness and families of those killed must be considered major stakeholders on a par with those duty holders the employers who create the risks that kill, maim and make ill.  Their opinions must be sought out and acted upon.
  
• In the recession we want H&S to have a high priority and must not be downgrades as ‘we can’t afford it now’ – this argument was used in the boom years too and we can’t afford not to have good H&S now.

• Talk about the real figures ( see Hazards Campaign article in SHP attached below) and HSE only referring to the 200 off being killed by work each year as grossly underestimating the real risk workers face and so undermining H&S enforcement and HSE/LA generally, allowing it and them to be pilloried in tabloids as over the top.  Judith Hackitt seemed to be ready to accept this point.

• HSE is failing at the moment in creating a credible threat of enforcement and hence encouraging employers compliance so ‘to continue.. taking enforcement action..’ is not good enough. On all measures HSE’s enforcement action has fallen – Nos of inspectors, Nos prosecutions, Nos of Improvement and Prohibition notices and inspections; and also HSE fails to investigate all injuries that meet their criteria by massive margin.  So more of the same will not do.

• We reject all deregulation of H&S and expect the HSE to do the same.

• We seriously questioned the implicit assumptions by the HSE in their strategy and in Judith Hackitt’s introduction, that there are only a small number o employers who are not complying with H&S law and that most employers are law abiding, aware of, informed and committed to doing the right H&S thing. Giving examples from all sectors of the economy, from public to private, large to small, and many trade union organised workplaces, we showed that this is not so an that lawlessness prevails.

• No more lip service to the value for safety reps and the union effect on health and safety but real  action on supporting safety reps in their work. The mechanism for prevention and good management of H&S is the partnership between workers and employers via worker involvement and consultation best carried out by union safety reps.  For  this mechanism to function properly requires HSE/LAs to enforce all the statutory duties on employers in  SRSC Regs and support safety reps in their jobs to ensure they talk to safety rep when they visit workplaces, provide information and feedback, develop a relationship with safety reps and respect them.

We want HSE/LA to remind and advise employers on their statutory duties to involve and consult workers and safety reps, and then to enforce these duties if employers are failing to comply. Inspectors need to be trained in safety reps rights and powers and reminded of their duty to communicate with them. We suggest that a champion of safety rep worker involvement be appointed at high level in HSE to ensure this is carried through from policy to front-line inspection and enforcement action.  

• In context of fragmentation of employment privatisation etc, we want Roving Safety Reps to carry the union safety effect into non-unionised SMEs and micro workplaces, via the supply chain, locally, via similar employer sites etc., and especially in the most dangerous industries such as construction and agriculture, but others too.

• HSE strategy talks of justice and accountability and we want that to be real. Logically this can only be achieved by giving directors legal duties for health and safety. The current voluntaristic approach to directors duties is not good enough and will be ineffective.  We gave examples of companies going into liquidation after killing a worker and the directors  not facing any charges at all (NW Aerosols) which is not justice and not accountability.

Plenary Report Back, Table 10 (Hazards Campaign table)

We did not manage to answer questions 1-7 specifically as set, but did discuss a series of points on the strategy and its subsequent delivery.  Six Observations.

1. We are pleased to see the commitment to enforcement as the first goal set out in the strategy. However, we questioned the use of the phrase ‘to continue .. taking enforcement action’. On almost any criterion one takes - inspectors, inspections, investigations, notices, prosecutions – HSE enforcement activity and capacity has been in decline during this decade to the point where it is now not credibly able to claim to do that with which it is legally mandated in terms of enforcement. And, given the unfolding economic situation, even standing still will leave its existing enforcement capabilities looking less credible.

2. We expressed concern about many of the assumptions of, and the language contained within, the document. Ideas such as proportionality, common-sense, and mutuality are problematic to say the least. Further, one wider context for the document is the 30 years improvement in injury rates, and here we take issue with the HSE’s continued use of its headline figure of 200-odd occupational fatalities per annum,. Including other deaths, certainly those from occupational disease, then the actual figure, as we know, is closer to 50,000 occupational fatalities per annum – and to continue to use the headline figure bolsters those who would perpetuate health and safety myths in the sense that this can be seen as a peripheral, marginal area.

3. We are pleased that the strategy document emphasises strong leadership – but in this context there is simply no sustainable argument for failing to apply legal duties upon directors for health and safety, and the HSE’s continued commitment to voluntary duties further undermines its credibility in this context. This is also based upon a series of false assumptions – that employers can be good, committed and competent – and in the experience of most of those around our table, most employers for most of the time are simply not these three things in combination. In  other words, non-compliance is not marginal, as the strategy assumes.

4. We are pleased to see the focus in the document on worker involvement. In this context, however, we agreed upon several points: that, not least in the context of increasing fragmentation and the continued rise of self-employment (not least in the construction sector), there should be HSE support for the use of roving safety reps.; that in general HSE should appoint a ‘Champion’ of worker involvement, who will highlight this key issue from the level of strategy through policy to on the ground delivery and practice; that relationships between safety reps and inspectors should be a priority in terms of these being developed and cemented, and that the first port of call on any inspection should be the safety rep; and that HSE should enforce the statutory duties upon employers in terms of safety reps and safety committees.

5. Relatedly, we agreed that training for safety reps must be maintained. Further, line managers, not least first line managers, should also receive more and better training. Thus, who gets trained, how they get trained, and where the resources for that training are to be found, are key priorities for the delivery of the strategy.

6. Lastly, and to return to point 2 above, and the language of proportionality and its sub-text of 'burdens', we want to make a final point: that the burdens of poor health and safety performance – with their physical, social, emotional and economic costs -  fall upon those who are killed, injured, and made ill, and their families. These are the real burdens of health and safety, and we would urge that those upon whom these burdens fall are included as consultation over this strategy proceeds.

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