West Yorkshire

[Sundae]

Some stories also come from misunderstandings of Health & Safety legislation, or establishments blaming it because they do not want to carry out a Risk Assessment/ get adequate insurance/ actually be bothered with the event in the first place.

There was a report issued recently regarding stories which had come up through the local press which had nothing to do with Health & Safety.
For example Local Child's Party Cancelled; Health & Safety Concerns because it's in a pub garden and a glass might have been left on a table from the night before. So family calls up the local fishwrapper, who go to the pub in question, who say blahblah health & safety. Picked up by a national because the Mum is fit and the child is a curly haired moppet with big eyes. Big headlines, then buried in the last line of the article is a quote from the Council saying they had not been approached regarding this issue.

When properly investigated it turns out that the pub in question just thought it might be a bit dangerous and you know what Health & Safety is like these days you're not allowed to do anything, and they were going to be short-staffed anyway...
So it's a self-fulfilling prophecy.

The report I read locally re the bunting was that there was one lampost which was affected. So rather than pay for repairs to ensure it was safe, far better to remove the efforts of volunteers

It's the same thinking that cuts funding for successful patient treatment clincs (asthma, diabetes, obesity etc) where patients are helped to manage their own conditions by a pharmacist and a nurse prescriber. Save money in the short term. Increased medication costs and hospital admissions will happen in another fiscal year and from a different budget after all.

[Carruthers]

I was going to post earlier, but went off to paint the fence instead (Oh joy!)

In the meantime, Sundae has neatly covered the subject so I'll just add this from the Daily Telegraph.

Health and safety has become synonymous with nanny statism, interfering jobsworths, ludicrous litigation and risk aversion. And yet the Health and Safety at Work Act, which is 40 years old this summer, has arguably saved more lives than any other piece of legislation, including the ban on drink driving or the compulsory wearing of seat belts in cars. It may well have reduced deaths by 5,000 or more.

So how did an Act that was by any measure a milestone in social reform turn into one of the most disparaged statutes of recent times? Partly it has to do with the way the law is interpreted – and often wrongly blamed for absurd restrictions imposed on perfectly innocuous practices. But it also reflects an absolutist view that it is possible to avoid accidental injury or death, rather than simply to reduce the circumstances in which they might occur.

Let’s fly the flag for the life-saving health and safety law

Given the Telegraphs's general outlook on life, it's surprising to see the article published there. However, some of the more forthright comments do tend to redress the balance.

Incidentally, I suspect that the term 'jobsworth' might not survive a trans-Atlantic exchange of electrons so allow me to assist.

"Jobsworth" is a British colloquial word derived from the phrase "I can't do that, it's more than my job's worth", meaning it might lose the person their job: taking the initiative and performing an action, and perhaps in the process breaking a rule, is beyond what the person feels their job description allows. Wikipedia.