6.1 Health & Safety

What is Health and Safety Work Act?

The Health and Safety at Work Act, 1974 (HASW) provides detailed guidelines for Health and Safety in the workplace. The Act states that ;

Employeers Legal Duties

• To ensure so far as reasonably practicable the health & saftey & welfare of all eployees

• Provide & maintain safeplant & safe systems of work

• Arrange safe hanadeliing & storage & transport of articles & substances

• Provide information, instruction training & supervision as is necessary to ensure the health & saftey at workof their employees

• Provide a safe palce of work & safe acess & egress

• provide and maintain a safe working environment & ensure adequte facilites for welfare

• Provide a written styatment of general polices

• Appiont a responsible person or saftey representative and form saftey comittes

• Provide persons not in their employment with the same as above

• Prevent emissions into the atmosotpheere

Employees legal duties

• Take reasonable care for the health & saftey of themselves and other who may be effected by /his her action at work

• To co-operate with their employeer under the relvant staturoy positsion

• No person shall reckelessy interfere with or misuse anything providied in the interest of heal th & saftey.

• Must use equipment provided in the interest of heaklth & saftey

• Every employee must report any work situation which present a serious & immediate danger to health & saftey

• Repot any accident

The Health and Safety at Work Act, 1974 not only covers the health and safety of employees but also extends to others using an organisation’s premises and equipment, for example volunteers, members of the public and committee members.

If your organisation or group provides physical or emotional care or support of any kind or has five employees or more you will owe a duty to take reasonable care for the safety of your users. If you fail to do so and an accident occurs as a result, your organisation could have to pay compensation to the user. This would be covered by public liability insurance, provided that the insurers have been informed of the activities undertaken by your organisation.

Do we need Health and Safety policy?

HASW requires that employers have a written health and safety policy and procedures for putting this policy into practice. The policy and procedures must be reviewed and revised regularly.  All staff in the organisation must be informed of the policy and any changes.

What about your employees and volunteers?
If your organisation employs paid staff, it will be seen as a small business by the enforcing authorities and you will have to meet the legal health and safety requirements such as carrying out risk assessments, providing employers’ liability insurance and meeting fire regulations.

If volunteers work in your organisation, the organisation also has a legal responsibility to them, and to the members of the public. This responsibility in law is called duty of care and under the law you have a duty to protect volunteers and members involved in your organisation’s activities.

Please note also that looking after the health and safety of your staff, volunteers and users is a practical demonstration of the value you attach to them.

Further Information

For further information on this area, please see the Health & Safety Handbook for Voluntary & Community Organisations.  There is a copy in the Resource library at Voluntary Action Luton. This book can be easily read and will meet the needs of all members of the voluntary sector, from the small community group with only a handful of volunteers and an income of a few pounds, to the much larger organisation with many paid workers and an annual income of thousands of pounds.

Also in the Resource Library at Voluntary Action Luton are:

“Voluntary But Not Amateur”, an excellent book which covers this area in very practical way.

The Voluntary Sector Legal Handbook, a clear and concise guide to all aspects of law relating to voluntary organisations.

• Al Hinde, Charlie Kavanagh, Jill Barlow: The Health & Safety Handbook, Directory of Social Change.

•  Forbes, Hayes and Reason, Voluntary But Not Amateur, 4th Edition, LVSC 1994

• Sandy Andirondack & James Sinclair Taylor, Voluntary Sector Legal Handbook, Directory of Social Change