Last month, the HSE ended its ‘Working Well’ roadshow, which featured stops in seven cities across Great Britain. In each city, the HSE met with business leaders, worker representatives and regulators to discuss ways to improve health and safety across all industries. While each stop featured different key speakers, the message was centred on the HSE’s five-year health and safety strategy plan. The three overarching aspects of the strategy were:
- Collective ownership: Each industry must examine its contributions to health and safety, and work toward instituting cost-effective and efficient practices.
- Prioritising health: Businesses need to prioritise health along with safety in order to help reduce the more than 23 million working days lost each year due to work-related ill health. This costs the British economy an estimated £4 billion annually.
- Boosting Britain’s businesses: Information concerning health and safety—including new processes, methods and equipment—should be shared with every industry in a timely manner to help encourage growth.
The roadshow sought to help rebrand health and safety as a common-sense issue rather than one of bureaucracy. Therefore, to prepare for the new five-year strategy, your business should do the following:
- Perform an in-depth review of all health and safety practices.
- Initiate discussions with your employees about what improvements could be made to existing health and safety practices.
For more information about the HSE Working Well roadshow, you can visit its YouTube channel, which offers summaries from each event and highlights from keynote speakers’ presentations.
