Ensuring Health and Safety in the Workplace

• Health & Safety
• Further Education (Key Stage 5)

Ensuring Health and Safety in the Workplace

Learning Objective

Understand Health and Safety responsibilities from a legal and organisational perspective for 

• internal and external stakeholders, 
• equipment and materials, 
• and work areas.

Tell me what you already know about Health and Safety responsibilities in the workplace?

Legal Responsibilities

Legal duties regarding Health and Safety for employees, employers, and external parties.

Legal responsibilities

The Health & Safety at Work(Northern Ireland)Order 1978

Duty of Employers

• To ensure the health, safety and welfare of staff as far as reasonably practicable
• To do everything reasonable and practicable to eradicate or minimise the risks of harm from all health, including violence
• To undertake risk assessments to identify hazards, how severe they are and how likely they are to occur.
• Once risk assessments are competed, processes and procedures should be put in place to eliminate the risks or at the very least to reduce them to a minimum.
• The employer must identify the nature and extent of the hazard and devise measures that will provide a safe workplace and a safe system of work.

 

Duty of employees

 

• Ensure duty of care
  
• Keep employers and customers safe
  
• Avoid damage to equipment and property
  
• Comply with legislation.
• Avoid negative consequences which could result in lost productivity, business disruption, staff shortages, long term effects on employee health, damage to organisation’s image and reputation
  
• To ensure that they are aware of the risk assessment process
  
• To follow any process and procedure put in place by their employer.
  

What are some key responsibilities of employees with regards to their duty of care in the workplace?

Duty of Care

• Your employer has a duty of care to staff, clients and customers.

This includes providing a safe place to work

• Their responsibilities include:
  
• Selecting employees competent for the task
  
• Providing proper equipment and machinery
  
• Making sure there a proper system of work and effective supervision
  

Organisational Responsibilities

Organisational policies and procedures related to Health and Safety for all stakeholders.

The Health & Safety at Work(Northern Ireland)Order 1978 says

• The employer must prepare a written policy addressing the H&S of employees, and the organisation.
  
• The policy must contain:
  
• A company statement of intent demonstrating their commitment to H&S
  
• Clearly identify who, in the company, is responsible and accountable for the H&S of employees
  
• Set out the arrangements, systems and procedures to ensure that work is carried out safely.
  

Have you seen or read the Health & Safety policy in your workplace?

Yes

No

I don't know

Internal Stakeholders

Roles and responsibilities of employees, managers, and supervisors in maintaining Health and Safety standards.

Explain what a Stakeholder is?

External Stakeholders

Responsibilities toward customers, visitors, suppliers, and the community regarding Health and Safety.

Equipment and Materials

HSWA places duties on employers to provide their employees with:

• safe machinery, equipment and systems of work – this includes all equipment used at events, from structures to lasers and generators
  
• methods for ensuring equipment and harmful substances are used properly and stored safely
  
• necessary information, instruction, supervision and training
  
• a safe and healthy workplace
  
• a safe and healthy work environment, including adequate lighting, heating, ventilation and toilet facilities

Work Area

Maintaining a safe and hazard-free work environment through regular inspections and risk assessments.

Internal Stakeholders Activity

Group discussion: Identify potential Health and Safety responsibilities for different roles within the organization.

Case Study: H&S Incident

Review this case study of a H&S related incident and discuss the Health and Safety responsibilities involved.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/essex/3162988.stm

External Stakeholders Discussion

Class discussion: Brainstorm ways in which the event organiser can ensure Health and Safety for external stakeholders.

Assessment: Scenario Response

• You are the Event organiser for a band night in a local club. 
• There are three live bands playing, the genre is rock and heavy metal. 
• You have capacity for 250 attendees. 
• The venue is mostly standing with seating for 50 in a separate tiered area. 
• Alcohol is on sale from the bar.
• List your H&S concerns and possible measures you can put in place.

Case Study Reflection

Reflect on the case study presented earlier and discuss the lessons learned about Health and Safety responsibilities.

Summarizing Key Points

Recap the main Health and Safety responsibilities for internal and external stakeholders, equipment and materials, and work areas.

Conclusion and Q&A

Do you feel more confident about Health & Safety in the events industry?

I know more about H&S in Event Safety

😒🙁😐🙂😃

Write down 3 things you learned in this lesson.

Have students enter three things they learned in this lesson. With this they can indicate their own learning efficiency of this lesson.

Write down 2 things you want to know more about.

Here, students enter two things they would like to know more about. This not only increases involvement, but also gives them more ownership.

Ask 1 question about something you haven't quite understood yet.

The students indicate here (in question form) with which part of the material they still have difficulty. For the teacher, this not only provides insight into the extent to which the students understand/master the material, but also a good starting point for the next lesson.