SERTUC Health & Safety Seminar 2013

I arrived late and then had to leave early from this excellent health and safety seminar organised by SERTUC (South Eastern Trade Union Congress) which took place the other week at Congress House.

When I arrived Gerard Stilliard, a partner at trade union solicitors, Thompsons (seen
at London UNISON safety committee earlier this year) was speaking about the removal by the Government of Civil liability therefore returning workers protection to that of pre-1878 and the need to prove negligence. He finished his speech by thanking the audience and wishing us all "Good luck" in the future since "we will need it".

Next to speak was  Mike Wilcock, Head of Operations in the South East Health and Safety Executive (HSE). Mike (see picture above) became interested in health and safety because he trained as an industrial chemist and got blown up in a factory in France. He was unimpressed that the French safety inspector looking into this incident was more concerned about going to lunch with the factory owner.

He is very proud of the work of the HSE and concerned that due to reductions in the number of his staff, they now have act more as Policemen and are not "here to help". Real health & safety is not about banning conkers, its about stopping people being killed and injured. Regarding the recent reviews of safety legislation, he accepts that simplification and clarity is good. We must be careful not to throw the baby out with the bath water. In Qatar 40 workers have already been killed building the 2022 World Cup stadiums. In the UK we had no deaths when building the Olympics. 

He can now only send inspectors into the highest risk employers. Those who kill and injure the most.  But what and who fills the gap? It has to be the professional safety advisers and trade unions safety reps. Use to have 70% proactive inspections now 70% plus are reactive. HSE will now charge employers £122 per hour if they have to write to them or issue a notice.

In Q&A I asked if trade union safety reps were being expected to help fill the gap caused by the reduction in HSE Inspectors, they should be given the power to issue provisional improvement notices? (PINS) This would give reps greater credibility. Martin disagreed and said that safety reps are already credible and often are better trained than managers. He also didn't think it was at all likely in the "current landscape".

Next speaker was Dr Jenny Harries,  Regional director South of England for Public Health. For her  good health is good for business and the workforce. Public health is everyone's business. See the Marmot Review. Clear link with good employment and good health.  Poor employment and unemployment with poor health.  The affluent tend to retire without disability and live longer.

Stress is still the biggest cause of sickness. Companies with higher levels of staff engagement have 13% lower staff turnover, they have less than half the UK average sickness absence rate and consistently outperform on the FTSE 100 (reference Sunday Times : Best companies to work for in the UK).

I then had to leave for another meeting which is a shame since as a union safety rep I want to know more about "well being" at work as well as avoiding direct injuries and diseases. It is an area that I don't think the unions or the employers do anywhere near enough on.

It’s criminal what this Government is doing to the victims of violent crime

Picture is from UNISON Greater London Health & Safety network meeting last week with guest speaker(4th from right back) Gerard Stilliard from Thompsons Solicitors. 

Every 3 months, following the meeting of our regional committee on safety, all London UNISON branch H&S officers are invited to attend a briefing by Thompsons on various safety related issues.

Gerard had been asked to speak about changes to the Criminal Injuries Compensation Scheme in 2012.

Now, I knew that this Tory led government, with the active support of the Liberal Democrats, had made changes to the scheme, but what I didn’t realise is just how bad these changes were, especially for those at work who are attacked and badly assaulted.

Gerard explained that under the new scheme, eligibility and awards have been slashed. Any tariff awards less than £2500 have been removed entirely. While compensation for the rest of claims have been reduced on average by 50%.

Which means that in the past if you were for example a healthcare assistant and you had been badly beaten up by a patient, which took up to 3 months to recover, you would have received under the old rules £1750 in compensation. Now you would get nothing.

In the past if you had been a teaching assistant and been assaulted and punched so hard in the eye by a pupil that it resulted in permanent blurred or double vision, you would have received £4,400 to £8,200.  Now you would only get 1/2 to 2/3rds of that amount. Remember this is for permanent injuries! Was £4,400 under the old system too much?

Even worse, it use to be the case that loss of earnings awards due to injury were related to what you actually use to earn before the assault. Now it is only at statutory sick pay levels.

So if a Park warden had been so badly beaten up by drunken yobs that he or she could never return to paid work. Under the 2008 rules if the warden was aged 50, earned £15,000 per year and expected to retire at 65 then they could have expected to have received £225,000. Under 2012 rules they would only get £67,000. A loss of £158,000.

The government has also made it far difficult to claim, reducing time limits, not allowing managers to report cases to Police and slashing time limits for appeals.

Of course it is not only employees who are suffering from these cuts but all victims of violent crime.

In a civilised society the State has an absolute duty to protect all its citizens from criminals and deal responsibly with the consequences of this criminality for those who have suffered from it. The only citizens this Government gives a damn about are the 13,000 millionaires who will be given £100k plus tax cuts in 4 days time.