Complacency can be a powerful foe

This was particularly important, he told a recent IHEEM risk management seminar, since (as previous speaker and lawyer at Beachcroft Colin Moore had made clear, HEJ – September 2010), without the “back-up” of documented evidence that such systems were in place and active, the courts would take a dim view; potentially imposing fines of many thousands of pounds in the event of conviction for a breach of health and safety regulations.

Formerly a director and principal consultant at a “well-known and respected” consultancy practice, Alan Hambidge told delegates by way of introduction that he had over 18 years’ risk management experience. He had, he said, provided training to “many thousands” of delegates, conducted several hundred risk management audits, and co-ordinated thousands of risk management projects for clients including NHS Trusts, local authorities, universities, and housing associations. His current-day company, Empathy Environmental Consultants, offers training courses, policy and procedure development, and retained support and risk management audits, covering “39 health and safety issues”. Explaining why he and IHEEM had felt there was a need for a seminar session on health and safety risk management systems, he said that although, as Beachcroft’s Colin Moore had indicated, organisations like NHS acute and primary care Trusts, and private healthcare providers, were legally required to have in place robust health and safety and risk management systems, there remained “a fair number with pretty poor systems in use”. “In some areas,” he told the seminar, “Trusts are using pretty effective risk management system procedures and policies, but there are other areas, such as COSHH (the Control of Substances Hazardous to Health), where standards are surprisingly low.” One potential pitfall, he warned, was “the danger of simply following HTM guidance and then assuming that you are safe”. He explained: “Many NHS organisations have been driven by HTMs for many years but, while the Memoranda, and, for example, HGNs, provide useful guidance, they do not cover all the legislative requirements that, say, an estates director or manager responsible for the safe, efficient running of a large acute hospital estate will need to satisfy.”

Financial incentives