Join Lily Grundy and Rose McNeil as they talk through the Health and Safety forecast for 2024.
Podcast
James Muller: Hello, and welcome to the seventh of Weightmans safety season of podcasts.
James: Lily Grundy returns along with Rose McNeil, and they're going to talk you through health and safety, a forecast for twenty twenty four.
James: Please do remember to leave any questions you have in the comments. As in our eighth and final episode, we'll be answering some of your questions from throughout the series over to Rose and Lily.
Lilly Grundy: Hello, and welcome to this episode in our Health and Safety Series. This is the penultimate podcast in our series before we take questions from our listeners.
Lily: As we settle into twenty twenty four, we're giving some thought to the trends we're expecting to see in health and safety this year. And before we get stuck in, by way of introduction, my name is Lily Grundy. I'm a solicitor in the regular team here at Weightmans, and I joined the team in June of last year.
Lily: My practice background is predominantly in criminal defence, and I have experience in cases relating to criminal and regulatory investigations, criminal proceedings, interests, and public inquiries.
Rose McNeil: I'm Rose McNeil. I'm an associate in the regulatory team here at Weightmans, and I specialize in criminal and regulatory investigations following serious health and safety incidents. I'm regularly instructed to represent individuals and organizations facing investigation and prosecution for offenses under the health and safety at work act as well as gross negligence and corporate manslaughter.
Lily: Thanks, Rose. So perhaps a good place to start is analysing the trends we saw last year. So the HSE published their annual report last November.
Lily: And Rose, if you could just take us through the key statistics from that report.
Rose: Sure. So the HSEs report covers the period twenty twenty two is twenty twenty three. So over that period, the HSE investigated two hundred and thirty fatal accidents and five thousand five hundred non-fatal accidents.
Rose: In terms of timescales, they reported completing the majority of investigations within twelve months.
Rose: There are a total of two hundred and sixteen prosecutions of health and safety defences. That's pretty consistent with the downward trend for prosecutions of health and safety offenses that we've seen in the last decade. That being said, the conviction rate is still pretty impressive at ninety four percent.
Lily: So a relatively low percentage of cases, which are investigated are actually prosecuted, but of those prosecutions, there's a high success rate.
Rose: Yeah. Exactly.
Lily: So those are the statistics. And how does that fit with your experience of the HSE the last twelve months, would you say?
Rose: I have to say that our experience at Weightmans, and this does seem to be shared by solicitors across the sector is that we're finding that a number of serious accidents that we would ordinarily expect to be investigated just haven't.
Rose: Meanwhile, the more serious cases like fatalities are actually taking a lot longer than twelve months to investigate.
Rose: And the over the overall impression that we're forming is team is that HSE's resources are pretty stretched. And I don't think it would be surprising if we saw future enforcement action becoming more and more focused on particular areas.
Lily: Thanks, Rose. And would you say there's any shift in terms of the types of industry or the types of accident involved?
Rose: In terms of accidents, the statistics are pretty consistent with previous years. So a high percentage of accidents were attributable to construction, agriculture, manufacturing and transport.
Rose: So no real surprises there. The most common types of workplace injury are falls from height and being struck by a moving object or a vehicle.
Rose: Again, not unusual, kind of the same trends that we've had for the last decade or so. But I do think is really interesting is that last year we saw a real targeted focus on certain industries when it came to inspections.
Rose: In particular, construction, woodwork, fabricating, metalwork, stonework, and brick manufacturing.
Lily: That is interesting. And what do you think is driving those targeted inspections?
Rose: So one of the key priorities in the HSE's strategy for the next decade is reducing work related ill health. So that covers things like respiratory illness and musculoskeletal disorders. And those are really prevalent in those types of industries.
Lily: I suppose that corresponds with what you were saying earlier Rose about a general downward trend in the number of workplace fatalities and accidents?
Rose: Yeah. Definitely.
Rose: I think the reduction in accidents that we've seen in the last decade or so really is reflective.
Rose: Of a better attitude nationally towards safety standards, but arguably health standards need to catch up. And I think in a world where we're experiencing less of the traditional health and safety accidents that we're all used to. There's more room for inspectors focused on long term health impacts on employees I think that'll be a really big trend this year.
Lily: So the first big trend I suppose we're predicting for twenty twenty four is a focus by regulatory bodies on ill health.
Lily: Can you just talk us through that?
Rose: Yeah. So I think there'll be two big focuses in relation to ill health.
Rose: So the first is occupational lung disease, which we've on a little bit already, and the second is mental health.
Rose: Occupational lung disease has been a big focus for the agency for the last two years now. In the summer of twenty twenty three, they launched a nationwide inspection campaign called Dust Kills, and that targeted exposure to dust within the construction industry specifically.
Rose: And there was a similar campaign targeted in the Woodwick Industry in twenty twenty two. And again, that's because those types of industries are notorious for a higher risk of exposure to various types of dust, which were all associated with the development of serious occupational lung diseases.
Rose: Now the law places a general duty on employers to eliminate or reduce the risk of their employees' exposure to hazardous substances, and that includes dust So if you're working in an industry where exposure to dust is a risk, I would really recommend reviewing the outcomes of the HSE's just kills campaign. Because that really highlights some really good and bad practice, which was identified across the construction industry during that campaign.
Lily: I suppose historically we haven't really seen prosecutions related to respiratory illness, but do you think that might change in the coming years?
Rose: Yeah. I mean, in fact, I think it's already starting to. So in January of this year, we've started to see the outcome of prosecutions related to failures to control dust exposure, which were found during inspections that were undertaken in the summer of twenty twenty two. So given the number of inspections that the HSE did last year, I think it's possible, but that trend will continue.
Lily: Yeah.
Lily: And have you as you said, raised occupational lung disease isn't the only type of ill health that HSE are focusing on.
Rose: No. It's not, and I think a lot of people would be surprised to know that around half of all work related ill health cases, last year, were attributed to stress depression and anxiety, and that's all fed into the HSE's working minds campaign.
Lily: Yeah. It really encouraged employers to take a look at the working minds campaign if they haven't already.
Lily: The HSE and partner organizations have done great work implementing guidance materials and webinars to help employers understand their legal duties in relation to work related stress.
Lily: Another big health and safety issue is building safety regulation, and this has been on the horizon for the last couple of years. Following the Grenfell disaster in two thousand seventeen, but it feels like this year will be a real turning point.
Rose: Yeah. It does. As you said, for me, it's been a long time coming, but the building safety and safety act came into force in October of last year. And I think this year we'll really start to see the health and safety executive starting to proactively take on its role as the building safety regulator, also known as the BSR.
Rose: The BSR now has responsibility for regulating building standards during the construction and design phase of higher risk buildings. And they're defined under the Building Safety Act as those with at least two residential units and standing at least eighty meters or seven stories high. And although the definition of higher risk buildings under the act under the actor is pretty narrow, the introduction of the actors probably going to focus minds on building and fire safety more generally throughout the industry.
Lily: Thanks, Rose. I think the third and final big topic for twenty twenty four is Martin's law and the development of the draft terrorism protection of premises bill I know that it's something you're really interested in Rose having represented one of the core participants in the Manchester arena inquiry.
Rose: Yeah. I mean, this is a matter of real personal interest to me, given my experience in the inquiry and having heard all of the evidence so the bill and, Martin's Law as, it's kind of Known more colloquially, is the product of the work of Figen Murray OBE whose son Martin Heck was tragically killed in the Manchester Arena bombing, which took place in two thousand and seventeen.
Rose: So the public inquiry into the intact, it concluded last year. And there are a number of recommendations that were made by the chairman around, protect generally.
Rose: And since then there's been a broad consensus in the government and across the main political path that there should be more done to ensure that organizations prevent, prepare for, and mitigate against the risk of future terrorist attacks.
Rose: Now that all led to the draft terrorism protection of premises bill, which was published in draft last year. And that bill imposes a completely new duty on those in control of qualifying publicly accessible locations to do things like risk assess the threat of terror, implement measures to reduce the risk of terror attacks and to have in place robust plans to respond to terrorist attacks.
Lily: And that bill underwent legislative scrutiny by the home affairs select committee year, and they've raised some concerns and recommendations if you could just set those out for us Rose.
Rose: Yeah. So I mean, first, what I would say is that if anybody works in this sector, they think that they might be affected by the protect duty. I would really recommend reading the Home Affairs Select Committee report. It was a really, really interesting read, and they had, evidence from a number of experts.
Rose: And they really expressed concerns about the way in which the bill had been drafted, what I was actually seeking to achieve, whether it actually did that, and also whether or not it was proportionate particularly for smaller premises, which are known as standard tier premises.
Rose: And the committee has made a number of recommendations to the government and that includes things like the publication of guidance to help people comply staged implementation of the bill, so the enhanced here possibly going before the standard tier. Mandatory life saving courses, which is a really interesting prospect, and also new statutory standards for new buildings. So that ties in with what we speaking about earlier in terms of building safety more generally as well. And for all of those reasons, that bill is now undergoing a further public consultation, which is specifically targeted at the standard tier, and that's due to close later this month.
Rose: And we're really hopeful that that development is going to bring better clarity to the bill and we'll be preparing for the podcast as it develops.
Lily: Thanks, Rose. It'll certainly be interesting to see how this develops over time, and to our listeners do keep an eye out for future podcasts on this topic.
Lily: Just before we finish, there will be an opportunity to ask questions from throughout the series in the final episode of our Weightmans safety season podcast. So if anything has been of particular interest to you or if you have any questions for the team, feel free to get in touch.
James: Thank you for that Rose and Lily, and thank you all for listening to Weightmans safety season of podcasts.
James: The next podcast will be our eighth and final one of the series, where we'll be answering some of your questions from throughout the season.
James: So make sure not to miss our final podcast available from the eighteenth of March.