OPINION: REGULATIONS
AN INSPECTOR INVOICES
If an HSE inspector calls and finds that you are breaking health and safety laws, you may now be charged a fee to recover the costs of enforcement and for helping you put things right. Hywel Davies explains
Ever since the coalition government took office in May
2010, there has been a view that aspects of health and safety law are a burden on UK business, and so a target for the drive to deregulate and eliminate red tape. This has already led to the Lofstedt review of health and safety legislation, and to a major review of the Health and Safety Executive’s (HSE) Approved Codes of Practice. At the same time, government
has been looking to cut costs and raise revenues. And so the Health and Safety (Fees) Regulations 2012 place a duty on the HSE to recover the costs of carrying out its regulatory functions. These include inspections, investigations and taking enforcement action in cases where material breaches of health and safety law are found. Government believes businesses
that break health and safety laws should pay for the time HSE spend
Government has been looking to cut costs and raise revenues
helping to investigate and correct the breach and on taking enforcement action. This has previously been paid for out of public taxation. Introduction of the Fee For Intervention (FFI) is intended to encourage businesses to comply in the first place, or put matters right quickly when they don’t. It also aims to discourage businesses that try to gain competitive advantage by not complying with health and safety law, putting people at risk.
Fee for intervention HSE inspectors visit workplaces to inspect work activities or to investigate incidents or complaints. If, when they visit, they see material breaches of health and safety law, they will now charge a fee, based on the amount of time the inspector spends identifying the breach, helping to put it right and for any investigation leading to enforcement action. A ‘material breach’ occurs where
the workplace has broken a health and safety law and the inspector judges the breach serious enough to notify the employer in writing. They may notify a contravention, issue an improvement or prohibition notice, or prosecute. This will be determined by the circumstances, and by application of the HSE’s Enforcement Policy Statement (EPS) and Enforcement Management Model (EMM). Fundamental to these is the principle that enforcement action should be proportional to the health and safety risks and the seriousness of the breach. Examples of material breaches include: not providing guards or effective safety devices to prevent access to dangerous parts of
30 CIBSE Journal November 2012
www.cibsejournal.com
SHUTTERSTOCK / PAWEL PAPIS
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