Improve health and safety implementation to avoid safety overkill, experts claim

Companies need to improve their implementation of UK health and safety laws to avoid future compensation claims and prevent safety overkill, according to industry experts.

Following the release of the Lofstedt report, an independent review of health and safety legislation, companies are being called upon to review their implementation of safety policy to both reduce the number of accident injuries in the workplace and improve efficiency.

Roger Bibbings, occupational safety advisor at the The Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents (ROSPA), stated: "Lofstedt points out that it is not health and safety law which has caused unnecessary restrictions, but people's inability to implement it in a proportionate way based on risk assessment."

It is hoped that the Lofstedt report will promote a culture change and encourage employers to think about, and engage with, health and safety policy, to ensure that those schemes in place manage all risks and are appropriate for individual workplaces.

Published by Phil Hammond