General Contractor Guide for Health and Safety
Health & Safety Executive Do it Yourself Tips for Health and Safety
The Health and safety Executive (HSE) mainly investigate health and safety issues. The HSE is answerable to the Health and Safety Commission, and was set up by s10 of The Health and Safety At Work Act 1974 (HASAWA).
The function of the HSE is to enforce the health and safety at work legislation. On top of this The Secretary of State may delegate powers to local authorities to enforce certain provisions.
The HSE have the power to appoint inspectors who then have the right to enter your premises or site and carry out investigations and examinations. They can take samples of articles and substances to assist them in their investigations. They can ask questions about the practices that are going on and you are duty bound to give them the information that they require to allow them to continue their investigations.
An inspector can issue two types of notices if they feel it is necessary in the furtherance of good health and safety;
An Improvement Notice - an inspector will issue this if they feel that a particular provision is being contravened. It will identify the particular provision and the contractor will be given a period of time in which to clean up his act.
A Prohibition Notice - this will have the effect of stopping the contractor from continuing in his present activity. This will be issued if the practices that the contractor is putting into place are deemed to be placing people at risk of serious injury. It will state what it is he/she is doing wrong and state that unless this is put right immediately they will not be able to continue their present works.
It is an offence to prevent the inspector from carrying out their duties or to ignore either of the notices.
Infringements of duties under HASAWA and the various European Regulations that add to it, mostly give rise to Criminal prosecution, which basically means that a tradesperson who does not take his or her health and safety duties seriously, can be taken to task by the HSE and could face the risk of a very steep fine or imprisonment!