Health and safety regulation roll-back - a good idea or not?

Question

Health and Safety debate. The Tories want to remove health and safety regulations, and there might be a place for that, with over zealous officials canceling activities for all manner of reasons.

However - does anyone else recall the level of disasters in the late 80s, 90s? There was one after another due to lax health and safety. there was Kings Cross fire, Hillsborough disaster, Herald of Free Enterprise sinking, Marchioness sinking. hundreds of people dead due to health and safety violations.

With cuts coming up, do you think we are going back to these days?

Answer 1

over zealous health and safety have saved thousand of lives , check the statistics on building sites and construction companies

Britain's health and safety standards are improving every year thanks to them

companies need to stick to guidelines to prevent being sued or killing their workers

the cuts will affect the poor mostly , cleaning will be cut and current cleaners /nursery workers, other low paid workers will be forced to work even harder and then be blamed when things go wrong

Answer 2

Just had a thought. If this government relaxes the rules enough, say back to what they were when the last Tory government was in power. Companies could save money by not doing the things common sense should tell them to do again as before. Fewer policemen, teachers, firemen, trading standards officers, etc. The up side for the Con/dem government is that more poorer workers and people will be killed thus making this a very effective cut. Less people the more money and wealth for them. Sounds like a good idea for the people in this government as they can then start to recoup the money on the fiddles expenses they had to pay back. Seems they have learnt a good lesson from the bankers doesn't it? Fail, steal, be incompetent to a greater extent and make your money safe even increase it at the expense of the whole population. I expect that pretty soon our Con/dems will declare themselves more royal than the royal family we already have. They seem to think they are already.

Answer 3

There is a much more fundamental question than any which has yet been much aired.



It is: to what extent should we measure public well-being by the number of lives saved? As one example out of many, let us look at road safety.



It is clear that we could reduce the number of road deaths almost to zero if we mechanically limited the speed of all traffic down to about 10mph, padded the exterior of all vehicles and made a law (analogous to the seat-belt law) requiring all pedestrians to wear helmets and armour, and if we banned crossing any road except at official crossings.



It is also clear that if there were no road traffic rules at all, there would be many more deaths.



The question is now, where do we draw the line between the two ridiculous extremes? On the one hand, the number of deaths might become intolerable: on the other, we simply would not put up with being treated like helpless infants. We should think that a few extra deaths was a price worth paying for the extra freedom.



The extreme libertarian position (all restraint is bad) will not wash; but nor will the extreme safety one (any avoidable death is one too many). So at which point does preventing avoidable deaths become a malign, not a beneficial activity?



Could we have some suggestions, please, on how we should decide where to draw the line? And on which side of it do you think we are now?

Answer 4

h & s rules are getting removed and hopefully replaced with simple common sense. im sick of seeing wet floor signs in every public place when its obvious to all that the floor isnt wet. and the signs on cliff tops that warn us of a cliff edge. yes we can see the edge but we cant see the view because its spoiled by signs. btw the sensible rules will remain. boats will still have life jackets etc

kings cross fire was caused by smoking. and smoking will stay banned. hilsborough was caused by police. and the captain and crew were the cause of the ferry disaster. the h&s rules in place to stop those sort of disasters will remain.

Answer 5

To anyone with a brain cell scrapping health and safety regulation for school trips will end up in more children getting killed or injured,

If there is one teacher for every 10 children and so there will now be one teacher for every 30 children it is going to end up in a disaster.

School buses have crashed and what happens if the teacher is knocked out, and so who will guide the children?,

I hold this vile government responsible for any future disasters, and when they said that they would make changes which would go to the heart of what we held dear to us they were not joking.

BUT for the Liberal Democrats to be part of this is beyond belief, and why are decent liberal democrats supporting their leadership ?

Answer 6

I bloody well hope so...At least those who died did so happy.

With things the way they are I'm looking forward to escaping the health and safety brigade and jumping in the old wooden overcoat.

Answer 7

Remove or prune them?



For certain they need a good prune, but as you say wholesale cutting back would be suicidal.

Answer 8

the tory's are taking us back to the 80s in all ways,there will be more poor people than ever with the worst conditions ever seen.