HEALTH AND SAFETY ISSUES IN RETAIL FOOD STORES

For a decade now we have all heard the same mantras about the nanny state, red tape and the overregulation of the workplace by the Government and the HSE.

However if like me you were a practicing safety consultant you would be surprised at how little the health and safety laws impact on our business and social life in real terms. It is fair to state that newspapers trawl the courts and tribunals for scare stories and big claims but these are isolated cases and are the exception rather than the rule.

In real terms the only actual law you break if you ignore health and safety matters deliberately is section 2 of The Health and Safety at Work Act 1974. (2. -- (1) It shall be the duty of every employer to ensure, so far as is reasonably practicable, the health, safety and welfare at work of all his employees ).

This act makes it a legal duty to provide safe systems of work without exception for work persons and persons visiting the workplace whether for profit or not. There are also a number of regulations that underpin the act that give stated regulatory guidance and form the codes of best practice and that believe it or not are only the minimum requirements required by law. But when someone makes the claim that a workplace issue is against the law they are making a bold claim because any misdemeanour needs to be substantiated using current practical benchmarks to see if you the duty holder had maliciously created an unsafe situation. And without risk assessments and audit trails proving that you have not been reasonably practical is a very complicated process. In fact the aim of the Council and the HSE is to help you with information to provide and maintain a healthy and safe workplace, they are not in the business of shutting a business down.

As a shop owner you will be aware that anyone slipping up in your shop can make a claim against you, if you have put the person at risk and injured them, but that is their common law right not anything strictly to do with health and safety law.

Conversely if your Saturday helper cuts their finger on a meat slicer and it is found that they had not been trained properly to work the equipment, that would be breech of The Health and Safety at Work Act.

Another grey area to consider is the fact that shops are regulated by the Local Council and The Health and Safety Executive. And although the shop may be your accommodation upstairs or to the rear the actual working areas are deemed as workplaces, just the same as a factory.

This means that for instance some of the passive domestic testing procedures required for home gas installations and electrical installations become mandatory in the workplace, and they must be carried out by accredited engineers. This means that the boiler for your flat and shop needs to be inspected and serviced regularly as a piece of work equipment by a CORGI Registered engineer who will issue a proper safety certificate. The electrical systems that power the flat upstairs and the shop circuits need to be certified by an accredited electrician and a certificate of safety issued.

Your insurance company may already be pushing you to provide more certificates to prove that your shop is safe from the fire and the safety of work equipment point of view. If you suffer a fire you can stand to lose a considerable amount of the claim if the gas and electric are not certified as safe.

Currently a very onerous Health and Safety issue for the small business person which is a difficult issue to resolve is the duty to remove or manage Asbestos in the workplace. These requirements have been brought about in the workplace by latent and pernicious ill health, this requirement means that you need to ensure that you do not have any asbestos in the work area that is exposed or friable which could cause problems for you, the work persons and any visitors to the workplace or shop. You the shop owner have absolute legal duty to remove asbestos from the structure and fabric of your shop or actively manage the material by encapsulation. You will also need to archive and record where the material is located so that no one can accidentally pollute the atmosphere with asbestos fibres if drilling or building work is carried out within the premises.

Simple health and safety matters that always require attention are ensuring that you keep the floors free from slip and trip hazards, no curling lino or loose vinyl tiles should be allowed in the workplace, stores or on the shop floor.

Any person operating machines like slicers or microwaves should be trained to carry out the work safely and without harming themselves. If a person does not have a training certificate or has not been carefully trained by the owner duty holder they would deemed as not competent to carry out “high risk” work and therefore should not operate the machine. Employees handling raw or uncovered food should not be drug injecting addicts, have had Hepatitis, Aids or other contagious diseases in the recent past.

Plugging too many electrical appliances or fridges into multi gang extension plugs or adapters are the most common cause of fire in small premises. Ensure that you have provided enough power sockets of the right type or consult an electrician about modifying the circuits. Fridges should be serviced regularly so that fluff on the condensers and cooling fans do not catch on fire.

The portable appliances you use at work, kettles and fans for instance should be PAT tested to ensure that the leads and plugs are safe. If one of your employees gets a shock it is not just an accident it is a workplace incident and may attract the attentions of the local health and safety inspector.

Remember that the health and safety laws are considered by the UK health and safety commission and Government many years before they are applied in the workplace and the old theory that we just adopt European directives could not be further form the truth. Far from the UK having health and safety laws imposed on us, it tends to be the Northern European Countries including the UK that drive the Southern European countries to make their workplace safer, they are the countries that are being driven to adopt safer workplaces.

A few points you should remember to stay within the “law”.

1. If you employ more than 5 persons including yourself and other directors the enterprise should have written safety policy and safety management system. This might only be a safety file or central collection of all the safety certification for the shop and it does not need to be over bureaucratic.
2. It is advisable to have at least one nominated first aid person even if your employment numbers do not exceed the threshold numbers. Employees and Clients will look to the owner or the manager if an accident, fall or an ill health episode happens. Not being able to help or offer first aid can be a very frustrating and guilt inducing personal misfortune.
3. Make sure that the workplace does not have trips and slips on floors, asbestos in ceilings or aged un-serviced boilers in the background.
4. Make sure that all electrical equipment, coffee makers, slicers, heaters, toasters, fridges and kettles are checked for safety and are labelled as “safe to use”.
5. Make sure that all of the above are not plugged into one power socket which can blow and cause a fire.
6. Remember if good health and safety management is all common sense, why do we have so many people cluttering up the Accident and Emergency department with cuts, eye injuries and bad backs.
7. When you move heavy objects about the shop try and use sack trolleys wherever possible. It is so easy to strain your back even lifting small light items awkwardly. Always break down large packages and only store heavy items at low level. If one of you injures your back it can seriously impact on a small enterprise, apart from the sick leave and possible claims from employees.

The workplace is a dangerous place to be in if you are unaware of the possible injuries and ill health you can sustain over the normal working life of a working principal or working as an employee.

Every small business tries to keep costs to minimum but cutting corners with your own and your employees health and safety can cost you more than you think, and it could be more than you are saving in the long run. The health and safety executive or the local government inspectors will not normally pro actively come into your shop and use all this so called red tape and these vast amounts of regulation because they do not have the manpower. The most common problem that manifests itself, is if an accident occurs in the workplace and the person or employee attends the local hospital the local inspection team may pay you a visit to see if your workplace is safe. Your insurance company may also be involved because the employee wishes to claim on your employers liability insurance and this may trigger a visit from the insurance companies health and safety inspector.

The problem about safety audits and inspection visits is that they tend to expose shortcomings in your workplace or enterprise that you did not expect to be surveyed. Leaking taps, blocked drains and overloaded electrics can be seen as major problems by the professionals but you might not have the resources to rectify corrective issues found at short notice. Working from behind can impose many different strains on the principals of the enterprise.

Therefore make sure that you consider your shop and workplace from a safety perspective and apply some practical common sense about the working conditions, if you have an improvement program bite the bullet and start now, if you have employees that need training, arrange training.

If you do the simple things in good faith sooner rather than later the common sense we all claim to have will signpost what needs to be done to make your shop or enterprise safer and keep you out of the clutches of the regulators.

NEAL ETCHELLS - PROFESSIONAL HEALTH AND SAFETY CONSULTANTS www.healthandsafety.co.uk ; Tel:+44 (0) 208 778 7838

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