Safety representatives and committees in the NHS: a healthy situation?

Abstract

This article uses a survey of RCN safety representatives to examine the operation of the Safety Representatives andSafety Committees Regulations 1977. The survey's findings indicate that while NHS employers have become more supportive of such representatives, many are still failing to comply with their statutory obligations.

Worker representation in health and safety: options for regulatory reform

“…Again, positive views about the effectiveness of this system are widespread (Dyer, 1998). In fact, as suggested previously, there is scope to take this Australian approach further by providing representatives and their unions with powers to initiate private prosecutions for breaches of health and safety law and/or to bring complaints to an employment tribunal alleging that their rights relating to such matters as employer consultation, the carrying out of inspections and the provision of information, have been infringed (James and Kyprianou, 2000).…”

The contemporary British workplace: a safer and healthier place?

“…The regulations were developed out of the Robens committee call for a more self-regulatory framework of law, one in which management, by consulting with their employees, could manage employee interests and priorities more effectively (James and Kyprianou, 2000).…”

“…This, aligned to increasing budgetary constraints at the HSE, has resulted in a reduction in the number of inspections (CCA, 2004). Set alongside the decline in union representation and power over the last 20 years there is little to motivate employers to comply with these regulations and thus in many cases employees are denied their legal rights and have no means of obtaining redress (James and Kyprianou, 2000).…”

“…Added to this, only a minority of employers report being aware of either the SRSC or the HSCE Regulations and even then awareness is associated with a limited understanding of the regulations (HSE, 2000) or a lack of compliance where they were seen to be at odds with managerial priorities and interests (James and Kyprianou, 2000).…”

Occupational Safety and Health Committees: How Faresthe Pulse of the Self-Regulatory System in MalaysianManufacturing Firms?

“…Studies have been conducted in the United Kingdom as in [22], [23] and [45] that show a tension between legislative impetus and implementation attributable to varied factors noted in [22], [43] such as the following: power relationships between managers and workers; approach adopted by enforcement agencies, workplace size and origin, degree of trade unionization, industrial sector and the political, social and economic climate within which it operates. Some of the studies reviewed in [34] also lend credence to the fact that a tenuous relationship between legislative impetus and implementation may also prevail in other countries that have imbibed the spirit of the Roben's Model.…”