With a new Labour Government there is an opportunity for a new direction for occupational health and safety.
Opinion
Hazards Campaign – our 2024 manifesto for a health and safety system fit for ALL workers
By
on 19 August 2024
In 2019, after decades of health and safety regulation being undermined by an anti-health and safety narrative, and enforcement being impacted by cuts in resources, the Hazards Campaign produced our Decent jobs and decent lives manifesto¹. We called on the soon-to-be-elected government of December 2019 to:
- End (health and safety) deregulation and restore regulations and enforcement as a social good.
- Develop a health and safety system based on prevention, precaution and participation; and
- Provide real, enforceable employment and safety rights to ensure good health and safety in low paid precarious work via enforcement agencies working together.
Photograph: iStock/Tatiana Sviridova
While the 2019 manifesto has stood the test of time and remains fundamental to our demands for the new Government, five years on, we have experienced a world turned upside down with a global pandemic, and a previous government that gorged on Brexit and greed – putting wealth before workers and public health. There is a mental health crisis, a public health crisis and a deepening climate crisis that need urgently addressing.
Some young workers who entered the job market in recent years have no idea of the structure and risks in physical workplaces, or the mental health risks, conditions compounded by casual, zero hours or remote working. Many work activities are also being dictated by so-called artificial intelligence systems. All of these factors have resulted in the intensification of work and ever-increasing workloads with unsustainable demands – adding to the mental health pressures workers are already suffering from.
Then on top of this is a deepening climate crisis, creating weather extremes for workers in all different working environments. Workers face collapsing from heat stroke, travelling through floods and freezing in severe blizzard conditions.
Long-term impact of Covid
The continuing impact of Covid and the damage of long Covid is leaving a heavy toll on thousands of workers, with many suffering life-impacting and life-shortening ill health. The threat of more zoonoses is ever present and means we need to continue to be vigilant on infectious diseases and ensure infection controls, including properly fitted personal protective equipment is available and at a precautionary standard in all workplaces. All these and more led the Hazards Campaign to review the previous manifesto and add some new demands – A manifesto for a health and safety system fit for workers².
Improve occupational health services
One of the positives to emerge from the pandemic has been a better awareness of air quality and an understanding of the need to improve ventilation and air filtration³, and also the need to improve occupational health services. The Hazards Campaign wants this to be under the expert care and principles of an independent NHS – a national occupational health service that not only provides everyone with the opportunity to access decent independent occupational health support but also the essential prevention role which is often forgotten when considering the role of occupational health services.
The new national occupational health service should work closely with public health bodies to control and prevent future harms caused by toxic and hazardous substances and working environments.
Janet Newsham is chair at Hazards Campaign and coordinator at the Greater Manchester Hazards Centre. Photograph: Hazards Campaign
While hardly anyone would disagree with the principles set out in the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) mission statement: “our role goes beyond worker protection and includes public assurance. We work to ensure people feel safe, where they live, work and in their environment”, the Hazards Campaign suggests that action speaks louder than words and the reduction in the number of HSE health and safety prosecutions at a time where fatalities are increasing, does not bode well for a robust and effective enforcement authority.
HSE ‘should be free of political and industry influence’
The Hazards Campaign calls for the HSE to be independent of political and industry influence and without the motivation of financial recovery. We want workers’ health and lives to be at the centre of a health and safety system, with key principles to preserve life, prevent ill health and injury.
All workplaces should be a priority for our health and safety enforcement bodies. The risks in many of them are not fully controlled, leaving workers subject to violence, sexual harassment and bullying, around risks including timed toilet breaks, ever increasing and unachievable workloads, and intense scrutiny and monitoring. Work-related suicides continue to be ignored by the enforcement authorities and employers in the UK are still not being held to account. Directors’ duties must be a priority for this new Government and it must include imprisonment for those guilty of gross breaches of health and safety duties.
The full demands of our manifesto for the new Government cover a wide range of calls, including action on the risks to gig workers, sex and gender risk assessments, a whistleblowing help line, a return to a tripartite HSE and a review of the Industrial Injuries Advisory Council (IIAC).
We are ever hopeful that a new government brings renewed and strengthened health and safety laws and enforcement. Health and Safety regulation must be about prevention but it also about justice for the death or harm of a loved one.
Janet Newsham is chair at Hazards Campaign and coordinator at the Greater Manchester Hazards Centre.
Read the Hazards Campaign manifesto:
hazardscampaign.org.uk/blog/manifesto-for-a-health-and-safety-system-fit-for-all-workers
Follow and contact the Hazards Campaign at:
facebook.com/groups/123746101003963
References
OPINION
Hazards Campaign – our 2024 manifesto for a health and safety system fit for ALL workers
By on 01 January 0001