Health & Safety at Work is everyone’s responsibility – not just Management. We all have a Duty of Care to ensure that whatever we do or fail to do does not result in an accident or injury to ourselves, our Colleagues or Others who may be effected by our actions. However, in recent times it seems to me that some people / businesses / organisations may be using the concept of health & safety as an excuse for NOT doing somethings which they don’t like ! This, in my opinion, is giving health & safety a “bad” name and is an abuse of the laudable concept of safe places of work, safe work practices & systems and competent staff. I have heard it said that, in schools for instance, children are not permitted to do this or that during break time because of the possibility of an accident occurring ! Does this boil down to insurance and the possibility of litigation ?
An accident is an unplanned event and if Murphy’s Law is to be believed, if something can happen, it will happen ! But this should not prevent us from living a normal health life and gaining life experience which can stand us well down the road. Health & Safety is important but sticking to a very strict dogma in implementing it can go too far ! Cop-on & commonsense must play a part in our approach to health & safety
