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» Back to listing New statutory code to underpin inspection cuts

27th September 2012

 From April next year, low-risk businesses such as shops and offices will no longer be subject to proactive health and safety inspections unless a genuine employee complaint or notification of an actual incident is made to the HSE.

Exempting low-risk businesses from proactive inspections has been part of Government policy since March 2011, when former safety minister Chris Grayling launched the DWP framework, Good health and safety, Good for everyone.

While that document outlined plans to withdraw inspections from several “lower-risk” industries – including shops, offices, pubs and clubs – the Government is now intent on underpinning this policy with a new, binding statutory Code. Expected to be introduced in April 2013, the new Code will see the HSE direct all Local-Authority inspections, ruling out proactive inspections of low-risk businesses, while the Executive itself will be bound by the same principles.


In a further measure to free businesses from the fear of a “compensation culture”, the Government will also introduce legislation next month to ensure that businesses will only be held liable for civil damages in health and safety cases if they can be shown to have acted negligently. The change to the ‘strict-liability principle’, which was first suggested by Professor Löfstedt last year, will end the current situation where businesses can automatically be liable for damages even if they are not found negligent in a court of law.

 

 
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