In November 2011, Professor Löfstedt, a leading risk management specialist, chaired the Government’s review of health and safety legislation and published a report entitled ‘Reclaiming health and safety for all: An independent review of health and safety legislation’. In this report, Löfstedt recommended the exemption of self-employed workers whose work activities pose no potential risk of harm to others from regulation under the health and safety law. This marked a so-called ‘common sense’ approach which was endorsed by Government and confirmed in the Queen’s speech in May 2013.

Does exemption apply to you?

From October 2013, approximately 800,000 self-employed workers will become exempt under new health and safety legislation. These people work mostly on their own from home and have no contact with the general public, so pose no risk of harm. But there are 2.3 million self-employed workers in the UK who will still be subject to health and safety law because they work in industries that pose risk to others, such as construction, diving, mining, offshore and the nuclear industry. To the common man that seems like a sensible approach to maintain.

Communication

The upcoming changes to be made to exempt self-employed workers from health and safety legislation are likely to cause confusion amongst many employers. To ensure such confusion doesn’t take place, and that relevant self-employed workers understand whether or not they are exempt from the Health and Safety at Work Act (HSWA) legal duties, the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) will undertake communication activity to focus on minimising the confusion that may impact on legal compliance and how to access tailored information for guidance.

Guidance will apply to those who employ self-employed workers as contractors, including those in the prescribed sectors, activities and industries: agriculture, construction, gas installation and fitting, diving, mining, offshore, nuclear and railways will all still apply to health and safety law.

Changes in health and safety laws for the self-employed are on the side of common sense and the BSIF is fully supportive of that.