UNITE Health and Safety Stay safe
At the April Rural and Agricultural National Industrial Sector Committee [NISC] meeting Unite National Health and Safety Officer Rob Miguel reported two core matters – the fall in government funding for the Health and Safety Executive (HSE), and women and the role of union Safety Rep.
In April, the UK Covid-19 Inquiry held its second-stage preliminary hearing. The TUC issued its response to the Terms of Reference prior to the inquiry opening in July 2022, suggesting considerable extensions to the terms of reference with more detailed enquiries into specific areas, including: the effects on the education system, sector specific support for Key Workers, the effectiveness of government guidance and communication, and also of the inspection, regulation and enforcement of workspace safety, including transport; the role of employers and representative bodies, and the effectiveness of the relevant regulatory bodies, among other topics.
At the April NISC, Rob Miguel raised the question of what the Institute of Employment Rights report Covid and Safety at Work (HSE April 2021) called the “lamentable performance of the HSE in securing compliance with workplace safety and health standards in the face of the pandemic,” focusing on the loss of HSE funding over a decade, and the concomitant fall in the
n By Helen Armstrong
Latest on workers’ safety news
HSE - Failing for lack of funding
Continued govt funding cutbacks threatens workers’ lives
number of inspectors and inspections. Referencing the HSE business plan for 2016/17, government funding was £100m less in 2019/20, the year that Covid-19 began, than 10 years earlier in 2009/10 – a reduction of 46 per cent. Over a comparable period, HSE staff numbers fell from 3592 to 2371, including the loss of 502 inspectors. In 2010-2019 inspections fell by 38 per cent.
Despite the guidance, warnings and figures provided by HSE, its effectiveness is severely curtailed without inspections and enforcement, so that in 2021 it could no longer be viewed as a ‘credible regulator’.
The government provided £14m in May 2020 to help “Covid-secure” workplaces, but this was too little, too late. In some cases, the conditions in crowded workplaces were experienced as ‘breeding grounds’ for the virus.
By 2022, concerned about the conditions on construction sites, Unite published its own guide to safety for construction workers.
Miguel commented, “The decline in funding for the HSE over the last decade has left a situation where inspections and enforcement are inadequate to protect workers in many situations, particularly in smaller or remote workspaces. There is a need for
32 uniteLANDWORKERSummer 2023
a stronger legislative relationship between union and other workplace representatives, and the HSE.”
It is worth noting that following a recent inquest into how a Dorset farm worker was killed by a falling slab in 2021, Unite branch chair John Burbidge responded to the coroner, “The level of funding for the HSE has significantly fallen in real terms since 2011 because the government sees much of health and safety as red tape. This has led to a significant fall in farm safety inspections. Our members see hazards on farms that in other industries would mean a site closure for remedial measures to be taken – the underlying long running agricultural crisis is largely the cause. Fears of victimisation of whistle blowers remain, especially in farming.”
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The level of funding for the HSE has significantly fallen in real terms since 2011 be- cause the government sees much of health and safety as red tape
John Burbidge Unite health and safety expert
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