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The Health and Safety Executive is withering away. In the last five years it has lost more than 1 in 6 of its frontline inspectors, and there are more set to go. As safety prosecutions fall to an all time low, Hazards editor Rory O’Neill warns of a growing corporate accountability deficit – and says workers could end up paying with their lives.
Hazards, issue 104, November 2008 |
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HSE’s desperately poor safety enforcement record just
took a turn for the worse. Now 9 out of 10 major injuries
don’t result in an investigation, HSE inspections
have hit a new low and the last two years have seen the
worst enforcement performance on record. Hazards
says only dangerous employers now have reason to feel safe.
Hazards, issue 100, November 2007 |
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The government’s ‘work is good for you’
push to make the sick work is overlooking one inconvenient
truth. Hazards warns a combination of long hours,
job insecurity, punitive sick leave policies, a failure
to recognise the extent of the work-related health crisis
and a lack of safety enforcement means for many work is
bad and getting worse.
Hazards, issue 100, November 2007 |
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The resource-starved Health and Safety Executive can no
longer investigate some of the most serious workplace injuries.
Fatalities are rising. HSE needs help. It just doesn’t
seem to see it. Hazards editor Rory O’Neill
says not only is HSE failing, it is shunning its best possible
ally – trade union safety reps.
Hazards, issue 99, August 2007 |
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As workplace deaths rise dramatically and the Health and
Safety Executive’s austerity programme leaves it haemorrhaging
staff, mothballing work programmes and shutting offices,
Hazards looks for clues on what unions –
snubbed and so far refused any new rights by HSE after its
worker involvement consultation - should do next.
Hazards, issue 98, May 2007 |
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Some of Britain’s biggest companies have seriously
neglected their safety responsibilities, with deadly consequences.
Hazards editor Rory O’Neill asks how bad
it has to get before a top boss ends up behind bars.
Hazards, issue 97, February 2007 |
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The official safety watchdog is broke, can’t do its
job and is haemorrhaging staff. Hazards editor
Rory O’Neill predicts over-stretched and under-protected
workers will soon get sick of being fed the government’s
healthy lifestyle and “work is good for you”
line.
Hazards, issue 96, November 2006
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HSE top brass say the enforcement-lite safety watchdog is
performing well. But Hazards reveals HSE is facing
a deepening crisis, with workplace inspections hitting a
new low and HSE inspectors rapidly becoming an endangered
species.
Hazards, issue 95, August 2006 |
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What would criminals
think if the knew the police presence had dropped by over
25 per cent in three years, and more cuts were planned?
That’s exactly what has happened at the workplace,
where Health and Safety Executive (HSE) workplace inspections
have plummeted to a new low and HSE is increasingly relying
on companies to just say they’ll be safe.
Hazards, issue 94, May 2006
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The government is introducing a corporate crime bill with
no jail terms for corporate criminals. It is ripping up
large chunks of its “naming and shaming” database.
And the next official health and safety visit you get
may be from an “adviser” not an inspector.
Hazards, issue 93, February 2006
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Britain has got one of the most unregulated economies
in the industrial world. Tony Blair says so. But his government
is still embarking on a dangerous deregulation exercise
that could remove essential safety protections, says Hazards
editor Rory O’Neill.
Hazards,
issue 91, August 2005 |
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Safety controls are being undermined at work, and it's
the safety watchdog that is responsible. As the UK drops
down the world's safety rankings, Hazards looks
at the dangerous thinking behind its policy shift.
Hazards,
issue 88, November 2004
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The government's hands-off, business-friendly workplace
safety plans are in disarray after all its key points
were rubbished by a top all-party parliamentary committee.
Hazards, issue 87, August 2004
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Every week an
average of five workers are killed at work. Almost all
of these are the result of management failures, and all
of them are avoidable. Frances O'Grady, TUC's deputy general
secretary, says bosses guilty of safety crimes must face
justice.
Hazards,
issue 87,
August 2004 [pdf]
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The government says HSC's new safety blueprint is a "radical
new strategy." Business loves its hands off, no hassle,
no commitments language. But for you and me, the new strategy
offers nothing new and abandons hard won protections.
Hazards, issue 86, May 2004
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