Who is in charge?

Anonymous

The duty lies with the employer and with those in control of premises.

This sounds like the committee and trustees in your case so it's just as well that concerns and proposals for improvement have been put in writing to them.

Where 5 or more are employed, a written health and safety policy should indicate individual responsibilities for meeting these duties and say how this will be achieved.

Presumably whoever has the job of preparing risk assessments has done this and put forward any agreed proposals necessary to implement the established risk control measures?

Smita Jamdar - Martineau Solicitors
Online advisor - 17 posts

Dear Mr Hughes

Thank you for your recent enquiry regarding the delegation of health and safety responsibilities. I have assumed that in your organisation the trustees are the employer, but this will, of course, depend on the constitution of your organisation.

Before refusing to incur expenditure the trustees and the committee must be satisfied that the employer has done everything reasonably practicable to:-

1. ensure the health, safety and welfare at work of all its employees; and

2. ensure that other persons who may be affected by the undertaking are not exposed to risks to their health and safety

otherwise the employer will be committing an offence under the Health and Safety at Work Act.

Whilst the employer may delegate the day to day tasks related to health and safety to a manager, the responsibility for complying with these legal duties will always remain with the employer and can not be delegated.

The consequences of any refusal to implement suggested improvements would, of course, depend on a number of factors (please see below) however, if an incident did occur after the hazard had specifically been drawn to their attention and nothing was done, this would be a seriously aggravating feature.

Some examples of factors that would be taken into account in assessing whether the charity had complied with its duties are, the extent to which the hazard could have been avoided by implementing the suggested improvements, the level of risk posed by the hazard, whether there were more effective ways of reducing or eliminating the hazard and whether any alternatives were implemented. The answers should be easily identifiable from the charity?s risk assessment.

If the trustees and committee decide to veto health and safety suggestions, they should record the reasons for the veto in writing (for example as a result of risk assessments the risk was perceived to be very low or there was a more effective way of eliminating either the hazard which they implemented instead) and the trustees and/or committee should be confident that they have taken sufficient action to comply with their duties. The cost of making any improvements will be taken into consideration by a Court, but arguments that a course of action was not ?reasonably practicable? due to cost are unlikely to be viewed favourably unless it clearly involves a large outlay which would produce minimal benefit.

Finally, depending on the hazard involved there may also be other more specific duties that they have to comply with and these may be strict liability offences.

Kind regards

Smita Jamdar

Anonymous

I have always understood that charity trustees are personally responsible for their actions as trustees, and if a problem occurs as a result of disegarding professional advice, the trustees' personal assets could be at risk. In my experience, most trustees are completely unaware of the level of risk they are potentially exposed to.

Tom Hughes
Member - 2 posts

Thaks for information