Running a small or medium sized business is exciting, with huge rewards in terms of satisfaction and perhaps financial too. But it doesn’t come without enormous responsibilities, especially when it comes to legal compliance.
Failing to meet health and safety regulations can result in people getting injured, fines, business disruption and personal liability.
Legal compliance might seem a daunting challenge, but actually with the correct documentation in place, some basic training, and a positive health and safety culture, your business will be set up for long-term success.
Let’s break down exactly what is required of a small to medium sized company in terms of the basic requirements of UK law.
What does health and safety compliance mean?
If you are new to running a business, ‘health and safety’ might sound like something only large companies need worry about. In the UK, no matter the size of your company, you will almost certainly have responsibilities under UK law.
Put simply, health and safety compliance means doing everything in a ‘reasonably practicable’ way to protect everyone affected by your business, including employees, contractors, customers and the public.
There are many risks associated with the workplace, the most common being slips and trips, fire, unmaintained equipment, stress, chemicals and falls from height. The law doesn’t expect you as a business leader to eliminate all risks, but you are required to assess hazards, and then reduce the risk from those hazards to a ‘reasonable’ standard.
Risk assessments is the starting point for most businesses, and by following a systematic approach to risk assessment, your business will have a good solid foundation for legal compliance.
What are the main health and safety laws in the UK?
The main piece of legislation in the UK is the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974. This act places the duty of care very definitely on employers and business owners.
The Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999, require employers to carry out risk assessments, appoint competent people to provide health and safety advice, and to provide training and information to employees.
If an employee has a work-related accident, it may need to be reported to the Health and Safety Executive (HSE). The Reporting of Injuries, Disease and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations (RIDDOR) 2013 set out the process of notifying the HSE.
Although the above regulations are the absolute minimum for compliance, there are many more regulations that may apply to specific businesses. As a business owner, you must identify which of the plethora of regulations that might apply to your operations.
What are the basic health and safety duties of a business owner?
Here is a very simple summary of the critical duties you must meet to stay legally compliant:
Carry out risk assessments to identify hazards and risks associated with your work-related activities.
- Carry out risk assessments to identify hazards and risks associated with your work-related activities.
- Identify all health and safety regulations that apply to your business.
- Develop a health and safety policy.
- Provide appropriate training to personnel, which might include fire safety awareness, risk assessment, stress and wellbeing awareness and general health and safety.
- Maintain safe premises and safe equipment and ensure that regular checks are carried out of your premises and equipment.
- Carry out regular health and safety inspections of your premises and work activities.
- Report incidents to the HSE or to the Local Authority.
- Carry our fire risk assessment of your premises.
- Put in place a wellbeing strategy for employees, which might include providing basic awareness of work-related stress.
- Get competent advice, because they law says that employers must have access to competent advice on health and safety compliance.
What are the penalties for non-compliance?
Ignoring your health and safety responsibilities and duties would be very foolish because there are several ways the enforcing authority can hit your business.
- The HSE can issue an Enforcement Notice, which may stop your company operating.
- If a serious breach of legislation were to occur or if there was a serious injury or fatality, the HSE could prosecute you, which may result in large fines on your business or on you personally.
- Non-compliance with UK law may result in your business being unable to get Employer’s Liability insurance, or it might invalidate existing insurance.
- Damage to reputation is often the biggest issue if an accident becomes public knowledge, because suppliers or customers may drop your company.
In summary
Although there are repercussions if business leaders do not fulfil their legal obligations, compliance with health and safety law is not particularly difficult.
By adopting a proactive approach to health and safety and by embedding this into your business, health and safety will become an integral part of your operation.
Setting up your health and safety compliance strategy properly is an investment in your business’s future.
If you would like to discuss your health and safety concerns, please get in contact.
