The latest podcast by the Health & Safety Executive includes an interesting interview with the chair of the HSE, Judith Hackitt.
Hackitt admits that any review of occupational health and safety needed
“someone who could look beyond the remit of the Health and Safety Executive and look at what the other factors are out there that create the problems that we all know only too well that create all the nonsense and the myths.”
Lord Young certainly looks at other factors such as over-enthusiastic legal firms but it is hard to not think that someone other than Lord Young could have undertaken the review and come out with a more constructive plan of attack. In many ways his report confirms the misperceptions of OHS. Lord Young says, in his report:
“…the standing of health and safety in the eyes of the public has never been lower, and there is a growing fear among business owners of having to pay out for even the most unreasonable claims. Press articles recounting stories where health and safety rules have been applied in the most absurd manner, or disproportionate compensation claims have been awarded for trivial reasons, are a daily feature of our newspapers.”
This says more about the UK media than it does about the OHS laws themselves. Lord young is very light on his recommendations to curb or counter the inaccurate reporting by the media. He recommends combining food safety and OHS:
“Promote usage of the scheme by consumers by harnessing the power and influence of local and national media.”
He should have gone further but that would require looking at issues such as accuracy in reporting and the UK media is notorious for beat-ups and entrapment. UK newspapers feed on the “Yes Minister” absurdities of bureaucracy and when health and safety relates to children, in particular, they go all out. Continue reading “Lord Young OHS review welcomed by UK’s HSE”
According to Hackitt’s media statement she advised