Regulatory compliance and risk management
Regulatory compliance and risk management
Environmental law in the UK is enforced by individual local authorities and three national regulatory authorities.
- Environment Agency: England and Wales
- Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA): Scotland
- Northern Ireland Enforcement Agency (NIEA): Northern Irelance
Each of the above three agencies operate in broadly the same manner. The Environment Agency was created by the Environment Act 1995 and came into existence on 1 April 1996. It is the leading public body for protecting and improving the environment in England and Wales and is responsible to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) in England and the Department for Environment, Sustainability and Housing of the Welsh Assembly Government (WAG) in Wales.
In addition to national issues such as flood defence, the Agencies have responsibility for dealing with many business-related environmental issues.
Up until the last 30 years, the majority of environmental law was characterised by regulating businesses against the more easily identifiable, single issue, pollution sources, such as chimney emissions or discharges to water. Many forms of early environmental law were also focused on placing controls on how to minimise the effects of emissions and pollution once they had happened, rather than in ways to prevent their occurrence at source.
Most UK environmental law has its origins at European or international level. This is because many environmental problems, such as climate change, acid rain, biodiversity loss, resource depletion and deforestation are transboundary and the ill effects of one problem can be felt in different countries from those where the problem originates.
Key environmental law includes:
- Waste law: producer responsibility and specific legislation covering disposal of different types of waste.
- Air pollution law: includes reducing emissions from industrial processes, onsite energy generation and transportation, emissions trading, containment of refrigerants and others.
- Water law: including consents for discharge, use of water supply and abstraction.
- Climate change law: covers financial and legislative instruments used to reduce the emissions contributing towards global warming which have a significant impact on business in the UK.
- Contaminated land.
- Laws for the protection of natural resources and biodiversity.
As legal specialists with 17 years’ experience in the sector, Workplace Law is well placed to help clients not only meet their legal responsibilities, but to go beyond compliance to seek the benefits of embracing sustainability at the heart of their business.
We conduct independent compliance audits, reporting on general as well as specific environmental performance measures. We can also help put together a legal register of specific environmental legislation that your organisation has to comply with so that a structured approach can be taken.
In the event of an environmental incident or accident, we are also able to support you post-event and to advise and represent you in dealings with enforcing authorities and in legal proceedings.
Benefits
- Confidential advice and support on environmental law and compliance.
- Independent compliance audits give peace of mind and manage risk to avoid potential exposure.
- Flexible, responsible response in the event of incidents or accidents.
- Year-round, fixed-price support as part of our Environmental annual support contract.
Case studies
"In 2009 Chaps Ltd recognised that it needed to improve its health and safety systems. We changed our Health and Safety consultants to Workplace Law in order to give us a fresh approach towards our management of health and safety and to gain specialist construction advice.
"By using their expertise and experience Simon and Maria have guided us into developing a health and safety system that has achieved CHAS accreditation and given our customers and principle contractor’s confidence in our management of health and safety. They have always been available to offer advice when needed and to provide independent site inspections and audits which are often required by our customers.
"Both Simon and Maria continue to support Chaps Ltd and have become an important, integral part of our Health and Safety Management System."
Suzanne Jackson, HR Director, Emprise:
“Workplace Law has made a difference to the quality of the service we can provide to our staff. And because of the customised service from Workplace Law, the costs have come down.
“We’re now into the second year and we’re pleased with the level of service which is always turned around quickly with any queries being answered straight away.”
Martyn Ball, Head of HR at Akkeron Hotels:
“It’s not just telephone advice that we’ve come to rely on, Workplace Law consultants are also happy to attend our meetings in person and Jayn Bond has regular catch ups with us to discuss any HR related issues. Working with people you can trust is important to me and I value the personal relationship that we have developed with the team at Workplace Law.”
“The accreditation enhances our client services, evidences the robustness of our processes and demonstrates the passion and professionalism of our staff on every level.
“The exceptional support and input from the team at Workplace Law and in particular Simon Toseland, has ensured that the highest safety standards have been implemented and these are to be continually assessed and tested externally."
