What health and safety training in the workplace should I provide?

The golden rule about health and safety training: everyone who works for you needs to know how to work safely and without risk to their health – everyone should know what they are expected to do.

The Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974 requires every employer to provide whatever training, equipment, PPE and the necessary information to protect the safety and health of their employees. While regulations don’t state what level, you should provide an adequate training programme for the activities that your team do and the environments that they work in.

From busy manufacturing plants to a small business office, all workplaces come with their own health and safety hazards that mean different things to different businesses and sectors. What is required for a low-risk business is not what will be required for a high-risk business. So, a one size fits all approach is not the way to go. You’ll need to adapt your training to the level of risk that your business is exposed to so that your team can carry out their tasks safely and without risks to their health.

Investing in safety training will help your business to:

• Protect employees, identify hazards and adopt safe and healthy working practices
• Avoid the financial costs of accidents and ill health
• Promote a positive culture of health and safety
• Help people recognize ways to improve health and safety management
• Meet your legal duty to protect the health and safety of your employees and others

What workplace health and safety training do I need to provide?

Induction training for new employees: to assist them and to become familiar with their new workplace environment, team and procedures. This can include: fire safety and emergency procedures, first aid health and safety policies, accident reporting procedure, welfare support, safe use of workplace tools, machinery, equipment, risk assessments, personal protective equipment and how to follow emergency procedures. Click here to read some frequently asked questions about fire safety.

Refresher training: so that your team doesn’t forget anything. You don’t want to leave yourself exposed to the risk that people could become complacent with safety procedures that could lead to mistakes or errors.

Manager prompts: such as informal workplace safety meetings to share vital safety information to employees. The sessions will help reminder people of health and safety priorities and promote a positive safety culture within the organisation.

What do I need to cover?

Getting down to the specifics, depending on the nature and level of risk that your business poses, your training sessions should involve some, if not all, of these aspects:

• The Control of Asbestos at Work Regulations
• The Diving at Work Regulations
• The Health and Safety (First Aid) Regulations
• Noise at Work Regulations (NAW Regs) and The Control of Vibration at Work Regulations
• The Transport of Dangerous Goods (Safety Advisers) Regulations
• The Confined Spaces Regulations
• The Health and Safety (Display Screen Equipment) Regulations (DSE Regs)
• Dangerous Substances and Explosive Atmospheres Regulations
• Lifting Operations and Lifting Equipment Regulations
• Personal Protective Equipment at Work Regulations (PPE Regs)
• Control of Substances Hazardous to Health Regs (COSHH)
• The Construction (Design and Management) Regulation (Click here to read some frequently asked questions about CDM Regulations)
• Electricity at Work Regs
• The Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 Manual Handling Operations Regulations (MHO Regs). Click here to read some frequently asked questions about manual handling.
• Work equipment
• Provision and Use of Work Equipment (PUWE) Regs

Keep in mind that no workplace is 100% safe. Ultimately, health and safety is an ongoing process that means you can identify, monitor and reduce the risk associated with your business.

Click here to read some frequently asked questions about health and safety.