The UK is in “real danger” of taking a wrong turn on health and safety and undermining the good record and substantial achievements it has made in this area.
This was the warning issued by the Rt Hon Stephen Timms, Shadow minister for employment, in his keynote address to delegates at the IOSH 2013 conference in London’s ExCel this morning (26 February).
Thanking the health and safety profession on behalf of his east London constituents for their invaluable contribution to making London 2012 the safest Olympic and Paralympic Games ever Mr Timms emphasised: “Good health and safety is vital for the success of business. Countries around the world are right to admire the record of the UK. The Labour Party supports rigorous health and safety standards, applied with common sense. What we don’t want is our achievements and standards to be put at risk.”
By this he meant the current Coalition Government’s deregulatory agenda and its “superficial” acceptance of many of Prof Lofstedt’s recommendations. He explained: “While the Labour Party was particularly worried about the thrust of Lord Young’s review we very much welcomed Prof Lofstedt’s report.
“We agreed with his conclusion that there is no need to radically change or reduce legislation, and that those who create the risks are best placed to address them. The Government, in its response, said it supported his recommendations but the worry is that this support is only superficial.
“There is a real danger of the UK taking a wrong turn on health and safety and the Government undermining our achievements.”
Mr Timms highlighted the issue of civil liability as one on which the Government is heading in a very different direction from the Lofstedt recommendations. He said: “If their approach to this important area is indicative of how they intend to tackle health and safety in the future, then we have a problem.”
He also described as “unfortunate” the Government’s decision merely to consult on an enforcement code for Local Authorities, rather than heeding Prof Lofstedt’s call for the HSE to be given the power to direct all LA inspection and enforcement activity to ensure consistency.
The key to a future Labour government’s policy on health and safety would be to focus firmly on the evidence, something the current Government is ignoring in favour of ideology, claimed Mr Timms.
Should Labour win the next election, the MP promised that it would “deal in partnership with IOSH, the trades unions and businesses”. Among its priorities would be ensuring occupational health is taken as seriously as injury prevention.
He added: “We would promote a sound safety culture to underpin good business, and we would work with IOSH and others to safeguard our hard-won good record on health and safety.”
However, he was more circumspect on the issue of resourcing the HSE, responding to a question from the floor on increasing inspector numbers by saying a future Labour government “would not be in a position to sign up to spending more money in this area, or any other”.
He continued: “We regret the reductions in this area but, come the General Election, I am not sure what the situation will be, and we certainly need to do some hard thinking between now and then on this.”
Something he is in favour of in terms of resourcing is ‘fees for intervention’, which, the MP said, he agrees with “in principle”. He qualified this by saying that imposing such charges needs to done “sensibly” and that he would “watch the evidence as it unfolds”.
Below is a video of Stephen Timms talking at the IOSH Conference 2013.
