HSE Reports More Than Fifty Percent Drop In Inspection Numbers
Dailycsr.com – 31st December 2015 – The Statistics of “HSE and Local Authority Enforcement Liaison Committee” show that almost twenty five percent of the “local councils did not carry out any proactive inspections last year”.
The total number of visits paid by the local authorities in a total of “proactive and reactive inspections” combined with advisory visits dropped down by sixty one percent in the last six years.
The figures for the year of 2014-15 show that “736” inspection with HSE powers were conducted, whereby marking a four percent low in comparison to the previous year’s figures. Moreover, the paper states:
“If the competency of LA workplace health and safety regulators continues to decline, this will impact upon regulatory consistency and regulator effectiveness — leading to a failure to effectively enforce the law, burdens on business and negative public perception”.
According to the section 18 of the “Health and Safety at Work Act”, local authorities need proper arrangements in place to implements the guidance. However, as per the paper, LA is:
“...finding this increasingly challenging, with fewer and less experienced officers having to cover an ever wider range of regulatory duties, beyond health and safety”.
HSE receives an annual detail information about the regulatory activities of the “local authority health and safety teams”.
While, the minutes of the meeting goes like this:
“the perception among health and safety LA regulators is that priority is given to food regulation based on FSA [Food Standards Agency] requirements. We would welcome more support from the HSE and LGA [Local Government Association] in the promotion of health and safety regulation and reiteration of the absolute mandate for LAs to provide a competent regulatory service”.
References:
http://www.healthandsafetyatwork.com/
The total number of visits paid by the local authorities in a total of “proactive and reactive inspections” combined with advisory visits dropped down by sixty one percent in the last six years.
The figures for the year of 2014-15 show that “736” inspection with HSE powers were conducted, whereby marking a four percent low in comparison to the previous year’s figures. Moreover, the paper states:
“If the competency of LA workplace health and safety regulators continues to decline, this will impact upon regulatory consistency and regulator effectiveness — leading to a failure to effectively enforce the law, burdens on business and negative public perception”.
According to the section 18 of the “Health and Safety at Work Act”, local authorities need proper arrangements in place to implements the guidance. However, as per the paper, LA is:
“...finding this increasingly challenging, with fewer and less experienced officers having to cover an ever wider range of regulatory duties, beyond health and safety”.
HSE receives an annual detail information about the regulatory activities of the “local authority health and safety teams”.
While, the minutes of the meeting goes like this:
“the perception among health and safety LA regulators is that priority is given to food regulation based on FSA [Food Standards Agency] requirements. We would welcome more support from the HSE and LGA [Local Government Association] in the promotion of health and safety regulation and reiteration of the absolute mandate for LAs to provide a competent regulatory service”.
References:
http://www.healthandsafetyatwork.com/
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