Safety Matters – June 2025
The H&S Dept
Could poor eyesight be putting your drivers at risk?
A senior coroner has stated that the UK’s system for ensuring drivers have good eyesight is “unsafe”. With car accidents caused by poor eyesight at a six year high, its pertinent to consider whether you are doing enough as an employer to ensure your workers are safe to drive.
The UK is the only European country that doesn’t carry out any checks before the age of 70 on eyesight, and the responsibility falls to the driver to self-report eyesight issues to the DVLA. The coroner’s strong words follow inquiries into the deaths of four people struck by three different drivers, all with poor eye-sight.
What about in a work context and health and safety law? The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) state that it is the employer’s responsibility to ensure that (if driving is an element of your employee’s role) they are fit to drive. If an employee requires a medical certificate to drive then by law you are required to have these.
Be proactive. This could include providing regular eye tests, encouraging employees to report any eye-health concerns or anything that impairs their driver safety.
“Good riddance to bad rubbish”
The 31st March, saw the start of strict new waste and recycling rules coming into play in England and Wales. Any workplace with 10 or more employees will need to arrange for the collection of the following:
- Dry recyclable materials – such as plastic, glass, metal, paper and card (these last two will need to be separated from the rest of the dry recyclables unless local collections are mixed).
- Food waste
- Residual (non-recyclable) waste
Aside from these new rules it remains important to ensure that collected waste does not block emergency access or escape routes, nor should it pose a trip hazard. There are, of course, existing rules governing the hazards posed by toxic waste and sharps waste. And food waste comes with a health warning if not managed correctly thanks to the danger posed by rodents and insects.
If getting to grips with it all seems like it is wasting time for you, let us help you comply with your health and safety obligations so you can concentrate on running your business.
Worst case scenario
You have probably seen the recent news of a paddleboard business owner being jailed for 10 years and six months for gross negligence manslaughter following the deaths of four people in 2021.
This tragic loss of lives should have been avoidable and was deemed to be caused by a lack of action to manage the risks. This included not heeding severe weather warnings, proceeding despite heavy flooding and the river running fast; as well as not covering the presence of the weir where the disaster unfolded during the safety briefing.
As business owners there is a legal responsibility under the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974 (HSWA) to ensure the health and safety of employees and anyone affected by what you do or do not do, as far as “reasonably practicable”.
The case of the paddleboarder deaths is a stark reminder to all businesses of what the costs can be when health and safety rules are not followed.
No one should lose their life because of preventable circumstances. Ensuring that your business is following health and safety rules is paramount to ensuring the safety of all as far as reasonably practicable.
Loss of life and good health come first, but as well as such potential tragic repercussions of non-compliance, health and safety failings leave your business at risk of disruption or closure, the erosion of trust and a damaged reputation leading to a loss of customers and income.
You may also incur financial or custodial sentences if pursued through the courts, as this case demonstrates.
It is important to note, that for an offence to have been committed under HSWA there doesn’t need to have been anyone actually harmed, but there is a risk of harm, as those risks have not been properly managed or controlled.
If an offence has been committed you are liable to criminal law or maybe pursued under civil law for compensation. Find out more about the difference in these laws in our blog here.
Here at The Health & Safety Dept we work to ensure that the companies we work with are compliant with HSWA and other regulations relating to health and safety. Keeping the worst case scenario in mind can be a useful sense check. We are just a call away if you need support in ensuring that all standards are being met.
A clever health and safety solution
Musculoskeletal disorders include injuries or conditions to the back, joints or limbs. In 2023/24 32% of work-related ill health was attributed to these disorders (Labour Force Survey).
“The Musculoskeletal Disorders Risk Reduction Through Design” award is sponsored by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) and the Chartered Institute of Ergonomics and Human Factors (CIEHF). The award is a catalyst to encourage employers to adapt their work processes with the aim to reduce the risks of musculoskeletal harm to their workers.
With SMEs employing over half of the UK population, your business has the potential to help change the future for musculoskeletal disorders risk reduction. This year’s winner for SMEs was UPM Raflatac Ltd.
One of their workers suggested a ‘trolley’ solution to largely decrease the manual stacking of reels of laminate paper, which can weigh between 20-90kg. Manually stacking these at heights of up to 1.3m was a physical strain and posed risks of musculoskeletal disorders.
Their in-house engineering and production teams built a prototype which was then actively used by the workers. Their feedback allowed the company to create a system involving a trolley, fork lift truck and an engineered device to automatically upend and stack the reels. This process significantly reduced the manual handling of the heavy reels of laminate paper, thus reducing the risk of musculoskeletal disorders.
One of their operators said “It’s massively reduced manual handling when dealing with these reels and has made the task smoother, faster, and much safer. We can now get the reels from the floor into a large stack without any lifting.”
We love stories like this, showing that health and safety can be about creativity as well as compliance. Take a bow UPM Raflatac, but don’t strain your back when doing so!
eLearning of the month: Health and safety essentials training
Our 40 minute eLearning for health and safety essentials training is the perfect introduction to health and safety for your staff. Whether they are new to your workplace or need a refresher, this easy to access course is designed to help instil a culture of health and safety.
It is a great way to begin your legal compliance with staff health and safety training, and this essentials course will give them a foundation in the do’s and don’ts to avoid risks at work and keep everyone safe.
The course will take the learner through legal requirements, hazards and risk, PPE, safety signs at work and workplace emergency procedures e.g. fire evacuation. It also touches on fire awareness; slips, trips and falls; manual handling; basic DSE; basic COSHH; and electrical safety.
To find out more about this course or any of the others that we provide, please contact us today.
