STUC Response to The HSC Consultation
A Strategy for Workplace Health and Safety in Great Britain
to 2010 and beyond.
Introduction
The STUC is Scotland's Trade Union Centre. It exists to provide services for 46 affiliated trade unions and 32 trades union councils, representing 630,000 trade union members. Its purpose is to co- ordinate, develop and articulate the views and policies of the trade union movement in Scotland, reflecting the aspirations of trade unionists as workers and citizens.
STUC Policy on Health and Safety
The STUC welcomed the targets set under the current ten year strategy, "Revitalising Health and Safety", and viewed this action as essential in tackling the unacceptable level of workplace fatalities and major injuries suffered by Scottish workers. Every year We also welcomed the proposals outlined in the strategy to address major hazards in all workplaces. The STUC believes that it is a basic human right not to be killed, maimed or made ill by their employers and remain disappointed that recent published figures suggest that the current strategy is having little impact on the safety and health of Scottish workers.
To ensure success of the current, and any new strategy, the STUC believes that:
1) enforcement activity in HSE Field Operations Directorates and Local Authorities has to be increased. This will require provision of extra inspectors and support staff, allowing more proactive inspections, in addition to current activity in priority areas and accident investigation.
2) employers have to be pressurised into engaging in HSE initiatives, currently there is little incentive to do so as current intervention strategies are inadequate and sanctions imposed for breaches of legislation do not encourage improvement.
3) the government has to deliver manifesto promises in respect of outstanding legislation as outlined in the revitalising health and safety action points.
The HSC 7 Point Strategy
The trade union movement has developed a comprehensive network of health and safety representatives and have been at the forefront of health and safety improvement in the last three decades. We also recognise the role of the Health and Safety Executive and Local Authorities as enforcement bodies although we remain concerned that proactive inspections will be allowed to continue to decline as resources to both agencies are cut. We would welcome further discussion with the commission and executive to develop the current role of health and safety representatives therefore filling some of the gaps in current enforcement activity, giving representatives more power to stop dangerous work practices and serve provisional improvement notices. This would add value to the current enforcement strategy without compromising the role of the HSE and Local Authorities as principal enforcement agencies.
We would also agree with the view that the HSE needs to change and that more recognition needs to be given to health issues, although this should not be at the expense of current levels of enforcement activity or priorities aimed at reducing safety failures. The STUC feel that currently too much emphasis is placed on producing HSE guidance at the expense of regulation. The STUC is not against new or innovative approaches if they are supported by a legal duty by employers to implement new working practices. The experience of trade unions indicates that many employers continue to ignore new guidance introduced and, in common with other areas of employment relations and practices, voluntarism does not work.
The Health and Safety Executive recognises that there is a requirement to develop a distinct enforcement and advisory/support functions within the HSE. The provision of front line advice detracts from the core functions of enforcement officers. While we would agree that goal setting is more flexible we are concerned that, in Scotland, there appears to be little
improvement during the first years of the revitalising strategy. We would therefore support a more prescriptive approach to enforcement of health and safety legislation, especially in high-risk sectors such as construction and agriculture, in addition to target setting.
We acknowledge that the HSE works with finite resources, although if the Government is genuinely committed to improving health and safety of British workers we would suggest that there is a requirement for substantial increased resources for the HSE and Local Authority enforcement. Without this commitment we have concerns with regard to the long-term success of the revitalising strategy and this latest strategy moving beyond 2010. As outlined earlier the Health and Safety Commission should examine the activities that it feels, only that the HSE and Local Authorities can carry out bringing forward proposals, as part of this strategy to introduce powers for trade union health and safety representatives to issue provisional improvement notices.
The STUC supports the development of occupational health and safety advice provision outside the HSE and this is already provided by our affiliated organisations to their respective memberships. However there is a need for such a service aimed at workers in non-unionised or anti trade union workplaces. The STUC is currently involved in two initiatives, funded by the Scottish Executive, Safe and Healthy Working and Healthy Working Lives, the former aimed at providing advice and assistance to small and medium enterprises and the latter at investigating, as part of our health improvement agenda, a one stop shop to cater for employers and workers in organisations of all sizes. The STUC believes that preventing ill-health and accidents should be priority for all stakeholders, although our affiliated organisation recognise the need to assist members requiring workplace rehabilitation. Studies show that, where trade unions have been involved in workplace rehabilitation those who return to work after illness will remain in work longer than in cases where there is no union intervention. We would therefore request that trade unions should be involved any future initiatives in this area as this involvement is not clear from the document.
Recent studies by Unison and the Centre of Corporate Accountability indicate inconsistencies in effectiveness of HSE and Local Authority enforcement throughout the United Kingdom, with
Scotland performing well in local authority enforcement, but poorly in the industrial sectors covered by the HSE. We are of the view that the reason for this is lack of resources, as already highlighted, but we acknowledge the potential benefits that could be gained from the proposals to adopt a formal and co-ordinated approach to enforcement activity and goal setting. However, we doubt that the proposals will have significant impact in the absence of enforcement personnel to implement any new working arrangements.
Conclusion
The STUC recognise the need to move towards a culture of continuous improvement and the requirement to engage all social partners to achieve this aim. The trade union movement is already a principal driver for improvement in addition to regulators and, unless employers can be encouraged to accept the strong moral, as well as economic arguments and see themselves as key to sustained improvement, success of the current strategy and that for moving beyond 2010 will be threatened.
In addition to the benefits that can be achieved in enforcement activity by forging new working relationships, we believe that the HSC has to examine developing similar relationships between the HSE, Trade Unions and their safety representatives and providing increased powers for representatives within the workplace. We are disappointed that the strategy did not consider, or acknowledge, the benefits that could be achieved by strengthening the role of trade union appointed and trained health and safety representatives.