What’s the purpose of the Health and Safety at Work Act 2015? What are some of the tangible benefits of the Health and Safety at Work Act? In this article we consider just 5 common sense benefits from the Health and Safety at Work Act that help you keep your employees safe and health at work.

“Great things?” I hear you laugh. Yes, great things.

“Like What?”

Well, any good employer takes the safety of the people who work for them seriously. They understand that injuries pose a significant cost not only to their people but also to their business – a cost to business not only in terms of money and disrupted production, but also in loss of reputation. So, while a good employer understands that health and safety legislation like the Health and Safety at Work Act 2015 puts certain obligations on them to create a safe workplace, they also know that they have a duty of care to those who work for them – and have a genuine desire to fulfil that duty.

5 great things made possible by the Health and Safety at Work Act

A good employer looks beyond the obligations placed on them by the Health and Safety at Work Act and sees also the benefits and opportunities that flow from the legislation that helps make their job easier to care for their people.
Here are 5 great benefits that I see as flowing from the Health and Safety at Work Act 2015 – let me know what you think.

• The ConstructSafe scheme

Twelve months in and tens of thousands have passed the ConstructSafe test and are able to wear their competency like a badge of honour. (It’s also a great way to wind up the boss by showing you achieved a higher test score that they did…)
As the new national standard for health and safety competency in the construction industry, ConstructSafe provides a more efficient and effective framework for testing and measuring health and safety competence. That’s because ConstructSafe gives you a single, easy way to verify the competency of any worker working on your construction site, irrespective of which contractor they work for. It’s a great way for reducing the potential for untrained or inexperienced workers creating a hazardous situation for themselves or others in the workplace. The benefits of having more competent workers on site speak for themselves. So, adopting ConstructSafe isn’t just the responsible thing to do, it’s also the smart thing to do.

• Health and safety training

The Health and Safety at Work Act recognises that a well-functioning health and safety system relies on the participation of everyone working together on health and safety in the workplace. Training is the key to providing workers and others in the workplace with the highest reasonable level of protection from workplace health and safety risks. So now the focus is on real and effective health and safety training that teaches people how to identify hazards and what to do to mitigate the risks involved.

• Health and safety consultants

Ok, so I slipped this one in, but before you roll your eyes think of this:

With new legislation requiring a whole new practical approach to ensuring the highest level of health and safety in the workplace, are you up for the time and resources required to get to grips with the new requirements yourself or would you rather contract the services of someone expert in health and safety matters to quickly get your workplace up to speed?
Many companies have already acknowledged that it makes far better business sense to contract a health and safety consultant to focus solely on this, while they get on with the task of running their businesses.

• Better focus on health and safety

The Health and Safety at Work Act and its training requirements has shifted the focus from monitoring and recording health and safety incidents to proactively identifying and managing risks so everyone is safe and healthy. By focusing on what can really hurt people in the workplace, and what to do to mitigate the risks, this is a far more common sense and realistic approach to getting everyone at work to take the right actions to ensure their own health and safety, and that of others. Who of us can have a gripe against common sense?!

• Health and safety conversations

The guiding principles of the Health and Safety at Work Act have moved health and safety in the workplace from its former largely box-ticking, paper-shuffling approach to one of real, practical conversations. The training is all about talking with people with the aim of ensuring everyone in the workplace knows exactly what to do to keep themselves and others safe. There’s really no other way to achieve this goal than by having those quality conversations.

So, there you have it – my take on 5 great things made possible because of the Health and Safety at Work Act 2015.

Sensible Safety helps you keep workplace health and safety top of mind

If you would like help with ensuring your workplace complies with the requirements of the Health and Safety at Work Act and that all your workers are fully competent to ensure their own safety and that of others at work, then talk to the team at Sensible Safety. Our health and safety consultants are expert in all aspects of workplace health and safety and we’re just a phone call away. Call 021 294 7609 today to talk to one of our experienced health and safety consultants.

To find out how you can be compliant, be competitive, but care, contact us.