Principles for Health and Safety Management

Question 1

Explain moral reasons for an effective HS management.

Answer 1

• Without a moral code maintained in the workplace, employers will be tempted to leverage profits over the HS of employees.
• This moral code is based on the concept of an employer owing a duty of reasonable care to his employees.
• Society expects employers to have a moraly correct attitud towards the HS.
• Accident/Incident statistics reinforce this idea. And they also show that the HS risks rise in small companies as oppose to big ones.
• The duty to reasonable care is also owed to everyone effected by the company’s activities, like members of the public and contractors…

Question 2

Explain legal reasons for an effective HS management.

Answer 2

• Preventive : Enforcement notices -improvement and prohibition- by enforcement inspectors.
• Punitive : Fines and imprisonement By criminal court for breaches of legal duty against an organization of people within said organisation.
• Componsatory : sues from employees on civil court for compensation.
• Ideally, companies should self regulat and self police because they are in the best place to regulate its own activity and to eliminate seperate and costly regulator. If they do that they would identify and enforce the best HS standards for their activity.
• ILO OSHC (C155) 1981 has rendered a lot of moral duties for HS into HS legal duties of employers.

Question 3

What are the three basic general HS laws meantioned in C155?

Answer 3

• Employers shall be required to ensure that, so far as is resonably practicable, workplaces, machinery, equipement and processes under their control are safe and without risk to health.
• Employers are required to ensure that. so far as is reasonably practicable, the Chemical, Biological and Physical subsctances and agents under their control are without risk to health when the appropriate protection measures are applied.
• Employer are required to provide, when necessary, adequat protective clothing and equipement to prevent, so far as is reasonably procticable, risks of accident or of addverse effects to health.

Question 4

Explain economic reasons for an effective HS management.

Answer 4

accidents and ill health are costly and can be in 2:

• Direct Cost : calculable costs arising directly from the accident (fines, repaires, sick pay…)
• Indirect Cost : consequential costs and often more substancial than direct cost, generally do not involve actual monies (lost ordrers, workflow interruption)

Ensurance policies can make up for some of the costs of accident (employee compensation claims, dammage to vehicules…) but not for criminal procecution fines.

Although the employer can takeout ensurance policies against many types of loss for a premium specified by the ensurance company,

All employers are obligated to have some insurance against accidents and ill health like, employer liability, motor vehicule and public liability.

Some accidents are of indeterminate value because:

• The company may not have enough workforce or expertise to carry out the analysis.
• some costs may be missed entirely.
• a lot of incidents may not be recorded and thus wont enter in the statistics.
• difficulty estimating some more subtle items such as loss of moral or dammage to company image.

Question 5

What are the factors that contribute to an organization OHS standards and priorities?

Answer 5

Economical Climat.
Business Risk Profile.
Migrant Workers
Globalization of Business
Government policy and initiatives
Level of sick leave

Question 6

Explain how the Economical Climat can affect OHS standards and priorities?

Answer 6

Wealthy countries have the means to issue and enforce good OHS standard, as oppose to poor countries who may give OHS lower priority.

Question 7

Explain how the Government Policy and Initiatives can affect OHS standards and priorities?

Answer 7

because of their ability to legislate.

Question 8

Explain how the Industry/Business Risk Profile can affect OHS standards and prioritie?

Answer 8

High risk businesses require higher OHS standards than those that generate lower risk. Nuclear plants each required to work under a site license and demande higher OHS standards.

Question 9

Explain how the Globalization of business can affect OHS standards and priorities?

Answer 9

Businesses that work internationally have to operate under the local standards of the country that they’re in. Resolving difference in culture and communication may create different expectations and standards. OHS Standards in the UK maybe different from those of a defferent country.

Question 10

Explain how the Level of Sickness Absence can affect OHS standards and priorities?

Answer 10

The level is substantial in the UK with over 150 millions days lost each year. Emmployment and Support Allowances are paid to those who cannot work anymore because of an illness or a disability.

Question 11

Explain how the Migrant Workers can affect OHS standards and priorities?

Answer 11

I a country where there are a hight percentage of migrant workers, the cross-cultural differences may affect OHS standards. like the difference in the first language and workers accoustomed toworking to a different standards.

Question 12

Explain how the Societal Expectations to Equality can affect OHS standards and priorities?

Answer 12

OHS standards and priorities can be determined by the society’s changes in expectations to equality.
The Equality Act 2010 in the UK aimed to protecte disabled people and to prevent discrimination against them. It provides legal rights to them in the area of employement which made employees make reasonable adjustments in the workplace to accomodate them.

Question 13

What are the basic common elements in every MS?

Answer 13

Plan : Company Policy
Do : Arrangements made to put plan to action.
Check : Monitoring and assessing performance
Act : reviewing performance and continually emproving the system.

Question 14

Site 2 of the OHSMSs?

Answer 14

ISO 45001 : 2018 OHSMS - Requirements and guidance of use.

UK HGS65 managing for health and safety 2013 from HS executive.

Question 15

Describe the Planning step of the PDCA cycle?

Answer 15

• Status review.
• Planning and Policy to establish :
  what you want to achieve and how to achieve it
  how to measure your success
  who is responsible of what
• determining how to measure performance (leading and lagging indicators)

Question 16

Describe the Doing step of the PDCA cycle?

Answer 16

• Identifying risk profile :
  Assessing risks
  Identifying Harmfull elements in the workplace
  Identifying who it would harm and how
  Establishing measures to control those risks
  Identifying what to prioritize from those risks
• Organising your activities to deliver your plan:
  Involve workers and communicate
  Provide adequate ressources and competent advice
• Implementing your plan :
  Providing nessessary protective and preventive measures against risks
  Providing the right tools and equipements to do the job and maintaining them
  Train and instruct workers to ensure their competence
  Supervise to make sure arrangements are followed.

Question 17

Describe the Checking step of the PDCA cycle?

Answer 17

Measure your performance :
Assess how well your risks are being controlled
Investigate Accidents / Incidents and near misses and document them for review

Question 18

Describe the Acting step of the PDCA cycle?

Answer 18

• Review your performance :
  Learn from Accidents/Incidents, ill health data and errors and from other organizations.
  Re-visit policy documents, risk assessments to see if they need updating.
• Take action on lessons learnt

Question 19

What does an OHSMS do for management?

Answer 19

OHSMS sets a framwork for management to focus on in managing OHS. It contains the key elements of any management -policy planning, setting objectives and performance standards, providing ressources, making decisions and taking actions, accountability, monitoring and control- and helps management deligate day-to-day activities and co-ordinate in order to make sure objectives are being delivered.

Question 20

What are the key elements an OHSMS needs to deliver?

Answer 20

Appropriate allocation of ressources
Appropriate allocation of responsibility
Setting and monitoring performance standards
Feedback and implementing corrective measures

Question 21

Explain what is the appropriate allocation of ressources. and give examples.

Answer 21

Finantial resssources -training, equipements and consultancy…- and human ressources -enough people with the right skills- are essential in accident prevention. Risk assessment is a powerfull tool in determining the which risks take priority in allocating those ressources. Management expects the benefits to outweight the costs of accident prevention as it can be quite substantial. Prevention costs need to be controlled.
Those costs have a “lead time” meaning that money need to be paid upfront in order for the benefits to be felt. Training is an example of accident prevention measures, and it takes time to show results after expenditures has been incurred. Cost calculation has to be done very carefully so that they’re are definit figures available to demonstrate.

Question 22

Explain what is the appropriate allocation of responsabilities. and give examples.

Answer 22

Part of management is making sure responsibilities are allocated to individuals in the organization, althought everyone in the workplace is responsible for HS in the workplace to some extent, some have specific ones.
responsabilities need to be clear so that people know exactly what they are responsible for, allocated to people with the right qualification, supported by the appropriate ressources and linked to accountability.
Some specific HS responsabilities are : planning the implementation of HS policy, providing training, risk assessment in accordance to regulations, periodic monitoring of performance standards and checking contractors HS performance standards history before awarding contracts.

Question 23

Explain what is the setting and monitoring performance standards and give examples.

Answer 23

Every organisation need to know how well its performing in a certain task, and for that it needs something (standards) to measure. Performance standards help ensure that all the arrangements in the Safety Policy are transferred into action, they should be measurable, attainable and realistic.
They should be: clear so everyone know exactly what is expected of them, help identify the competencies needed by individuals to carry what is expected of them and form the basis to measure individual, group and organizational performance.
Perfornace standards need to describe :
- Who is responsible : a person or a position, they need to be competent.
- What they are responsible for : what needs to be done and how.
- When does it need to be done : regular occurence or irregular only durring certain tasks.
- What is the expected result : like meeting some legal requirements or attaining an organizational output.
In order to make sure that performance standards are been met, we have to monitor them. It can help identify any shortcomings and actions taken to correct them. It should be integral to MS and not just a check-up on individuals.

Question 24

Explain what is the feedback and implementing corrective measures and give examples.

Answer 24

An effectrive feedback system has to have a loop that allows for information obtained during monitoring and audit processes to be fed back to the appropriate individuals within the organization, so actions can be taken to correct any descrepancies.
An effective prevention of HS risks and improvement of HS culture stem from a sound OHSMS.

Question 25

Give simple justification to the introduction of OHSMS.

Answer 25

• Greater awarenees to legal requirements, which will reduce the chance of commiting an offence.
• Greater business efficiency, which will reduce costs.
• Greater bank and investor confidence by showing more effective risk management systems.
• Reduced insurance premiums by showing effective risk control.
• Improved relations and moral as employees see that their HS is taken care of.
• Improved HS performance, which will reduce costs of accidents / incidents.
• Improved company image by showing a morally correct attitude towards HS.

Question 26

What are the requirements for HS policy.

Answer 26

It is required by local legistlation in some regions, but even if it’s not required by law, it is required by ILO-OHS 2001 and ISO 45001 : 2018.
It needs to be documented by paper and electronically and authorised by top management CEO. It needs to be accompanied by organisation and arrangements within an OHSMS.

Question 27

General Principles for HS Policy

Answer 27

HS policy documents set out what needs to be done, who needs to do it and how its going to be achieved. So therefore, it is composed of :

• a statement of intent, that communicates the plans and objectives of the organisation to prevent HS risks and control them.
• an organized structure of the people with HS responsibilities and their role.
• arrangements : systems and procedures in controling risks.

Question 28

What the objectives of the HS policy should be.

Answer 28

A good starting point in terms of policy objectives should be total legal compliance and zero accidents. But we can be more practical and allign them with the contribution to business performance :
Supporting human resource developement
Establishing that any accident/incident and ill health is the result of shortcoming in management control rather than the fault of employees
Minimising financial losses which arise from avoidable unwanted scanarios
Developping a culture supportive of health and safety to achieve effective risk control
Developing systematic risk assement to identify risks and allocating resources to control them

Question 29

What are the elements of ILO-OHS 2001 OHSMS.

Answer 29

Policy, Organizing, Planning and implementation, Evaluation, Actions for Improvements, Audits and Continual emprovement.

Question 30

Describe Policy from the ILO-OHS 2001 OHSMS point of view.

Answer 30

Depelopped in consultancy with employees, and signed by a senior member of the organisation. It commits it to :

• Protecting the health and safety of the employees.
• Employee consultation and participation.
• Continual Improvement.
• Compliance to applicable laws and regulations.

Because the worker consultancy and participation is stongly stressed uppon in the guidance, it is recommanded to establish HS commitee and the recognition of safety representatives.

Question 31

Describe Organisation from the ILO-OHS 2001 OHSMS point of view.

Answer 31

Overall responsibility of HS is placed uppon Management, but specific rolls should be delegated throughout the organisation. And with that, the delegation of responsibilities, accountabilities and authorities. The structure and processes should be established to,

• Actively promot co-operation and effective two-way communication for the implementation of the OHSMS.
• Provide monitoring.
• Provide of adequate resources.
• Establish arrangements to identify and control HS risks the workplace.

The guidance strongly recommends the appointement of a senior individual who oversees the developement and maintainance of the OHSMS as a whole, promoting participation and periodic performance reporting.

Training and competence are the key to implementing of the OHSMS, its documentation should be created and maintained -policy, objectives, key responsibilities/roles, major hazards and measures of control / prevention, procedures- and keeping of records (health surveillance data, accidents and other monitoring data).

Question 32

Describe Planning and Implementation from the ILO-OHS 2001 OHSMS point of view.

Answer 32

It all starts with an initial review to establih the current position of the company. it should: Identify applicable laws, regulations and guidlines, risk assessment to the ogranisation, deciding if existing (or planned) controls are adequat and assessing health surveillance data… etc. This will set a baseline for future continual improvement.
Upnext is the planning, developement and implementation of the OHSMS baed on the intial and subsequent reviews. This includs the setting of realistic, achievable objectives and the plans to translate them into action. The selection of measuring criteria to see how well those objectives are being met and to allocate resources.
Preventive and Protetives measures should be planned and implemented to eliminate and/or control risks, they should follow the general hierarchy of risk control: eliminate, control at source (organisational controls and engineering), Minimise (Safe systems at work and administrative measures) and PPE if adequat risk controls can’t be implemented.
Management of change is also an important factor to consider in planning, change can be internal (new staff, new processes…) or external (merger, new laws…) and dealing with change should be managed systematically, an essential tool to do that is Risk assessment. This includes involving workers and making sure that any proposed changes are properly communicated to all affected parties.
Planning should include measure to control forseeable emergencies (Prevention, preparedness and intervention measures) like fire and earthquakes.
Procurement procedures should guarantee that any national and international HS requirements are an integral part of purshase or leasing specifications.
All HS reauirements should be applied to contractors, that includes contractor selection and their work on site(co-ordination and communication, hazard awareness, training, compliance monitoring, accident reporting… etc)

Question 33

Describe Evaluation from the ILO-OHS 2001 OHSMS point of view.

Answer 33

Procedure should be put into place to monitor evaluat and document the performance of the OHSMS. They should use a mixture of quantitative and qualitative, active and reactive performance measures. active monitoring includes inspections, compliance to law, acchievement of plans, surveilance etc. Ractive monitoring includes the investigation and recording of accidents/ill health and OHS system failures. Accidents/ill health should be properly investigated so that all the root cause failures of the OHS system are identified. They should also be properly documented and remedial actions implemented to avoid reccurence.
Organisations should have Audits policy that states the scope, frequency, methodology and competencies of these audits.
Audits evaluate the performance and effectiveness of the OHSMS elements or a sub-set and should at least cover:
Safety policy, responsibility/accountability, audits, competence, management of change, planning development and implementation, training, worker participation, communication, continual improvement, risk prevention and controls, prevention and corrective actions, management review, accident/ill health investigation, performance measures, OHSMS documents, emergency prepardeness, procurement and contracting.

Internal and external audits can be carried out in the organization, but unlike the ISO 45001:2018, external audits are not required and are not carried out by a certification body because there is no required certification, Instead of that ogranisations who want to carry one, can have auditors who are specificaly commisioned to do so.

Management review looks at the overall performance of the OHSMS and determines whether some changes need to be done in the system or parts of the system. This uses the monitoring, evaluation and auditing data as well as other factors such as management of change that may influence the compant in the future.

Question 34

Describe Actions for improvement from the ILO-OHS 2001 OHSMS point of view.

Answer 34

The peformance monitoring, audits and management reviews will result in a list of corrective actions. These should ensure firstly, that all the root causes of problemes needing correction are identified, and secondly, there is a system in place to correct those causes and to check whether those corrections are effective or not.

Question 35

Describe Continual Improvement from the ILO-OHS 2001 OHSMS point of view.

Answer 35

Continually improve the OHSMS and compare yourself to ther organisations.

Question 36

The elements of ISO 45001:2018 OHSMS.

Answer 36

Context of the organisation.
Worker needs and expectations.
Internal and external issues.
Intended outcoms of OHSMS.
Scope of the OHSMS.
Leadership and worker participation.
Planning.
Support and Operation.
Performance evaluation
Improvement.

Question 37

Describe Context of the Organisation from the ISO45001 : 2018 OHSMS point of view.

Answer 37

This requires that the OHSMS is developped and operated so it is appropriate to the organisation and its operative envireonment. it contains the scope of the OHSMS and the system itself, the needs and expectations of the workers and other interested parties (stakeholders) and the internal and external issues.
This requirement determines the environement on which the PDCA system will operate, its boundries and the system itself. this sets the scene.

Question 38

Describe Leadership and worker participation from the ISO45001 : 2018 OHSMS point of view.

Answer 38

This requires that OHSMS is driven by top management in the company and the active participation and engagement of the workers. it had four componunts : the commitment and leadership for safety, a clearely documented and communicated OHS policy, the allocation of clear responsibilities and authorities to roles of HS and the active participation and envolvement of workers.
It sits at the heart of the cycle which heavily emphasis management leadership. It also emphasis that top management should be personally involved in driving and promoting the system.

Question 39

Describe Planning from the ISO45001 : 2018 OHSMS point of view.

Answer 39

This requires that an ongoing planning process is present in the system to identify hazards, risks and opurtunities for improvement and that corrective actions are identified and planned. it has 2 componants: hazards assessment and risk and oppurtunities are identified and corrections are planed, setting of OHS objectives to maintain and continually improve the system.
This containes all the requirements nessessary to implement the planned arrangements, such as immergency prepardeness and risk assessment system.

Question 40

Describe Support from the ISO45001 : 2018 OHSMS point of view.

Answer 40

This requires the provision of ressources to implement, maintain and continually improve the system. This includes : provison of ressources, worker competence, creation and maintaining of OHSMS documents, OHS awarness and internal and external communication.

Question 41

Describe Operation from the ISO45001 : 2018 OHSMS point of view.

Answer 41

This requires that risks and hazards are operationally managed this includes, operational planning and control and emergency prepardness and response.
The first part setsout a hierarchy for risk controls that would be familiar : Eliminate, substitut, mitigate, organisational measures, adminisrative measures, PPE, And also a systematic management of change with an emphasys on procurement procedures and contracting standards and procedures and outsourcing.

Question 42

Describe Performance monitoring from the ISO45001 : 2018 OHSMS point of view.

Answer 42

Requires the systematic internal monitoring and measuring of OHS performance with a eye on driving continual improvement to the system: Internal moniotring, measuring, analysis and evaluation of the OHS performance. Establishement and operation of an internal auditing process. Establishement and operation of an internal management review.
This meets the requirements for the “Check” step in the PDCA cycle and identifies all the management tasks that will ocupy the OHS managers time in terms of colection, analysis, dissemination and consideration of performance metrics.

Question 43

Describe Improvement from the ISO45001 : 2018 OHSMS point of view.

Answer 43

This embeds the principle of learning lessons and implementing what you learned into the OHSMS, this includes : Identify and act opurtunities for improvement, continual improvement of the OHSMS, Establishement of procedures for inspection, investigations and
This sets at the “ACT” section to close the loop of the PDCA cycle, it explicitly requires both organisational learning and ongoing enhancement of OHSMS. In practical terms, it sets the OHS management routine activities such as investigations, inspections and identification of non-conformeties.

Question 44

Describe Documentaion from the ISO45001 : 2018 OHSMS point of view.

Answer 44

The creation and maintainance of documented information is required by the standards so that conformance to the management system can be verified.
The conformance to the standard is verified by an external accredited certification body such as BSI or LRQA so that certification can be achieved. It will then be used to show proof of a robust OHSMS. It can have internal benefits where the organisation will show it to internal interested parties, or externally to potential clients, government agencies or customers to show that OHSM is in the routine activities of the organisation.
Accereditation is the process of an organisation having their internal processess verified to see if they meet the regulatory authority’s standards, for example by UKAS.

Question 45

Benefits of Integrating MS

Answer 45

• IMS should involve an overall management review where the momentum of one element will drive forward others that might otherwise stagnate. In contrast, independant system might develope with disregard to elements of other systems which will increase incompatibility.
• Operates more cost effectively, which facilitates decision making that best reflects the overall organisation needs.
• Lead to the avoidance of duplication in paperwork, personel, electronic record-keeping, audits and meetings.
• Positive culture in one element can be carried out to another.
• The objectives and processes are essentially the same.
• More rewarding career opurtunities for specialists.
• Reduced possibility of resolving problemes at the expense of creating new ones in other disciplines.

Question 46

Limitations of Integrating MS

Answer 46

• Existing system may already work to well together, integrating may threaten the consistency and coherence of curent arrangements that have the support of everyone.
• Relevant specialists may continue to area of their core expertise without the need for any furthur specialist training.
• The performance requirements of HS and E are underpinned by regulations and law, quality performance requirements are dictated by customer satisfaction.
• The requirements of systems may differ accross different topics, this will introduce unecessary bureaucracy to the topics who require less complexity.
• Negative culture in one element could be carried over to other.
• Uncertainty regarding key terms would be exacerbated in an IMS
• A powerfull, integrated team may reduce ownership of topics from line management.
• Regulators and single topic auditors may have a hard time verifying their part of the system if it’s interwoven with other systems that are of no concern to them.