The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) is consulting on proposals to simplify and clarify the reporting of injuries, diseases and dangerous occurrences. The move follows a recent report which recommended the removal of unnecessary health and safety regulations.
At the moment the Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations (RIDDOR) 1995 requires businesses to report certain incidents to regulators. These include the more serious work-related injuries and illnesses, as well as incidents that have the potential to cause serious harm.
Certain injuries to members of the public are reportable too.
The HSE is now proposing to remove the duty to report in cases where the information is of little use or better collected through other means, while still ensuring that sufficient, quality data is available.
The HSE also proposes that self-employed people should no longer have to report injuries or illness to themselves, and that both the duty on employers to report dangerous occurrences outside of high-risk sectors/activities and the requirement to report most occupational diseases, should be removed.
The need to report all fatal injuries to workers and those to members of the public as a result of a work activity would remain - as would the duty to report major injuries to workers.
The proposals are in response to two earlier publications. The first, the Latest Review into health and safety legislation, published in November 2011, recommended that ambiguity over reporting requirements should be removed, while the second, a 2010 Government report, recommended a re-examination of RIDDOR to determine whether it was the best approach to providing an accurate national picture of workplace accidents.
The 2010 report also recommended that employers should no longer have to report injuries that keep workers off normal duties for three or more days, but that the time limit should be extended to seven or more days. This recommendation has already been implemented, and came into force in April this year.
