Risk Assessments

Phil,
As above they do need to be competent. If they provide advice that is wrong and there is an incident as a result they will be liable.
I've attended courses where 'competent' people couldn't even answer IOSH working safely level questions, which would personally put the fear of the man upstairs in me if I'd employed them.

Phil
The one extra point I would make is that if your knowledge is thin and you are the senior manager/director accountable for H&S how do you get assurance that your organisation is compliant if your H&S 'competent person' isn't that competent? Ultimately it will be the director/senior manager accountable who is answerable in a Court of Law.

There is no need to be accredited, but the person does have to be a responsible & competent person to fulfil the role. Doesn't sound like this person is!

I kind of realised they WERE required by law, but wasn't sure how to phrase the question to get the great answers I have above, without being specific about the roles involved.
The company that provided the training, well, I don't trust their advice, simple as.

The material you have included above is exactly what I was looking for in the response, so Thank you very much.

I will ask one more question, Does the responsible person for H&S have to be certified in any way by an accredited organisation, such as IOSH?

What I would add to the above comments is also check the government Communities website for the relevant guide on carrying out a risk assessment in your workplace. It offers layperson practical advice and the guides are split between 12 different workplaces and are the initial benchmark. Anyone who has done a course on carrying out a risk assessment should be able to use at least the general parts of the guide for the more straightforward workplaces; it would depend on what the course covered, its duration and the quality of teaching; the background of the assessor is also significant e.g. have they done any form of H&S training previously et al

It is important as an assessor to know when you are out of your depth especially in bigger sites or where there are higher hazard processes or other significant risks.

You can download the guides free at:
www.communities.gov.uk/fire/firesafety/firesafetylaw/

Andy
info@firesafetyoa.co.uk

Suggest that you or your risk assessor obtain a copy of L21 the ' Management of health and safety at work regs 1999' and turn to page 4 regulation 3 and associated ACOP on pages 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 and 11. Further reading of the regs would assist with a greater understanding of their responsibility.

I would also suggest that the person log on to the HSE web site where a great deal of assistance is availablethis would broaden the experience.

RA's should be suitable, sufficient and proportionate to the risk, insignificant risk can be ignored (ACOP 13a) its at this point where experienced risk assessors can seperate the wheat from the chaff

erm, yes.

The law requires that responsible people in organisations assess reasonably forseeable risks from the companies activities and to put in place control measures to reduce those risks.

If they refuse to complete a RA, then I suggest you do one and pass your findings on to this person and further management.

It's probably a combination of poor teaching and a little knowledge causing the employees brain to melt.

Are risk assessments required by law?
I ask because of a recent discussion at my workplace, where a perceived risk was not covered by RA(s).
The person responsible for RA's attended a course recently, hosted by an outside company that deals with most H&S Legislation; IMO, either he didn't listen or they're not that great at teaching H&S.
I have asked on several occasions for different RA's to be provided, but usually brushed off with "not needed"