Uses of, and Reasons for, Introducing a Health and Safety Management System

Question 1

Legal Requirements to Management Health and Safety

Answer 1

Justification relies on Moral, Legal and Financial reasons.

MHSWR

Question 2

Legal reasons to Management Health and Safety

Answer 2

The Management of Health and Safety at Work Regs 1999.
These Regs set out a strategy for managing Health and Safety by requiring the Employer to assess and control risks, have emergency arrangements in place, provide information and training, and consider shared workplaces, third parties on the premises and vulnerable people.

Question 3

Employers requirements under MHSWR

Answer 3

Make suitable and sufficient risk assessments of risk to Employees and others
Apply the principles of prevention or control of risks
Have arrangements for planning, organisation, control, monitoring and review of control measures
Have health surveillance where appropriate
Have access to competent Health and Safety assistance
Establish procedures for serious and imminent danger
Provide information to Employees
Co-operate with other employers who share the same workplace
Provide Health and Safety training for employees
Assess risks to women of child-bearing age, and new or expectant mothers
Ensure the protection of any young person employed

Question 4

Employees requirements under MHSWR

Answer 4

To use any equipment and substances in a manner to which they have been trained and instructed
To notify their employer of any dangerous work situation

Question 5

Duty to Have a written health and safety policy

Answer 5

Section 2 (3) of HSWA
Sets out the plan by which the Organisation will achieve legal compliance and control risk
Applies to all employers who have five or more employees

Question 6

Arrangements for Effective Planning, Organisation, Control, Monitoring and Review of Preventive and Protective Measures

Answer 6

Management of Health and Safety requires policy and planning, delivery of policy objectives, Effective risk control, performance monitoring and performance review with action taken on lessons learnt.
MHSWR Regulation 5 - Statement in respect of arrangements for implementing policy - Every Employer shall make and give effect to such arrangements as are appropriate, having regard to the nature of his activities and the size of his undertaking, for the effective planning, organisation, control, monitoring and review of the preventive and protective measures.
MHSWR Regulation 5 - Where the Employer employs five or more employees he shall record the arrangements

Question 7

Access to Competent Health and Safety Advice

Answer 7

MHSWR Regulation 7
Every Employer to appoint one or more competent persons to assist him in undertaking the measures he needs to take to comply with the requirements and prohibitions imposed upon him
Where the Employer appoints persons for Health and Safety advice, he shall make arrangements for ensuring adequate co-operation between them.
The Employer is to ensure that the number of people appointed are provided with the time to fulfill their obligations.

Question 8

Common elements of a Management System

Answer 8

Plan - Consider a policy
Do - Consider the arrangements for putting the plan into practice
Check - Assess and Monitor Performance
Act - Performance should be reviewed leading to continuous improvement in the Management System

Question 9

General principles of 18001 Management System

Answer 9

Plan - Policy & Planning
Do - Risk Profiling, Organisation and Implementation of the Plan
Check - Measuring performance and investigating accidents and incidents
Act - Reviewing performance and Learning lessons

Question 10

Plan (What to do)

Answer 10

Status review of where you are and where you need to be
Policy and planning to establish what you want to achieve, who will be responsible for what, How to achieve your aims and how to measure success.
Establish how to measure performance (Leading and Lagging indicators)

Question 11

Do (What to do)

Answer 11

Identify risk profile by assessing risks, identifying what could cause harm, Establish who it could harm and how, Decide what to do to manage the risk and decide what the priorities are and identify the biggest risks.
Organisation activities to deliver your plan - Involve workers and communication, provide adequate resources including competent advice
Implement your plan - Decide on preventive and protective measures you need and put them in place, Provide the right tools and equipment to do the job and keep them maintained, Train and instruct to ensure everyone is competent to carry out their work and supervise to make sure that arrangements are followed.

Question 12

Check (What to do)

Answer 12

Measure performance by assessing how well your risks are being controlled and investigate the causes of accidents, incidents and near misses.

Question 13

Act (What to do)

Answer 13

Review your performance by learning from accidents and relevant experience from other organisations, revisit plans, policy and risk assessments
Take action on lessons learnt, including from audit and inspection reports.

Question 14

What does Management involve?

Answer 14

Policy making
Setting objectives and performance standards
Providing resources
Making judgements
Making decisions
Taking action
Accountability
Monitoring and control

Question 15

Key issues that a Health and Safety Management System is required to delivery

Answer 15

Appropriate allocation of resources
Appropriate allocation of responsibilities
Setting and monitoring performance standards
Feedback and Implementation corrective action

Question 16

Appropriate allocation of Resources

Answer 16

Provision of both financial (Equipment, Training, Consultancy) and Manpower.
Benefits should outweigh the costs
Money spent ahead of benefits being felt
Careful consideration to be taken of how to calculate the cost of accidents so there are definite figures available to demonstrate the benefits

Question 17

Appropriate allocation of Responsibilities

Answer 17

Making sure that responsibilities for specific tasks and roles are allocated
Responsibilities must be clear so people know what they are responsible for
Responsibilities must be allocated to people with the necessary competence
People must be supported with the necessary resources
People must be linked to accountability
Everyone has responsibility for Health and Safety to some extent
Some people will have specific additional responsibilities which may include preparing plans to implement policy, Carrying out risk assessments, Periodic monitoring of Health and Safety performance, Providing training and Checking contractors Health and Safety performance before awarding contracts

Question 18

Setting and Monitoring Performance Standards

Answer 18

To determine how well an organisation is performing, you need to have something to measure.
Standards should set out clearly what people need to do to contribute to an environment free of injuries, they should help identify the competencies which individuals need to fulfill their responsibilities and they should form the basis for measuring individual, group and organisational performance.

Question 19

What should good performance standards help to identify?

Answer 19

Who is responsible - Either by name or position
What they are responsible for - What needs to be done and how
When the work should be done - Is it a regular occurrence?
What the expected result is - Legal compliance, Certain level of noise etc.

Question 20

Feedback and Implementation of Corrective Action

Answer 20

Every system must have a loop to be effective.
By feeding back information obtained during monitoring and audits to the appropriate people within the organisation, suitable corrective action can be implemented. Without this function, the whole management system will fail to develop and become a paper exercise with no improvement in safety.

Question 21

Justification for introducing a Health and Safety Management System

Answer 21

Better Health and Safety performance, reducing costs from accidents
Greater awareness of legal requirements, reducing chance of committing offences
Improved relations and morale
Improved image and positive public relations
Greater business efficiency which will reduce costs
Reduced insurance premiums, by demonstrating effective risk control
Greater confidence from banks and investors