Mike Denison

The International Organisation for Standardisation’s consultation via The British Standards Institution on the new International Standard ISO 45001 will help to put health and safety back in the spotlight. The draft standard emphasises top management involvement and accountability, worker engagement and participation and the need to prevent ill health rather than just injuries and largely replicates current GB legal requirements.

This standard will help propel health and safety up the business priority list and will be part of the journey in making sure H&S can take its rightful seat at the strategic top table. H&S is on the cusp of a new era, but on a route already undertaken by environmental sustainability.

The launch of environmental management standard ISO 14001 last September showed that the focus of environmental management has changed from being inward-looking and ‘operational’ to broader, outward-looking and with a life-cycle perspective. These developments have helped sustainability become an integral part of the business model – and I expect we will see the same result from ISO 45001.

Health and safety will move further out of the domain of the H&S professional and become more rooted in the boardroom. This will allow it to become embedded across the organisation’s value chains, including its key support functions such as procurement.

Directors will be reminded that they are accountable for H&S management and will need to demonstrate leadership. Importantly, workers will become more active participants – not only because they are potentially best-placed to help identify hazards and risks, but also because a strong health and safety culture requires the involvement and buy-in of all staff.

But there’s an important caveat here – these changes will not happen overnight. Companies will need time and support to understand them and adjust, as was illustrated by the introduction of Environmental Management Systems (EMS) under ISO 14001. EEF research at the time found that 80% of companies did not have sufficient top level support to meet the new ISO 14001 requirements, while 42% said that top management had little or no involvement.

The requirement to look beyond the walls of your own business and at the health and safety standards within your supply chain is positive. Many larger multi-site and multi-contractor businesses already do this and they are concerned about imposing unnecessary costs on their supply chain by requiring them to demonstrate they meet the new standard. The level of scrutiny and transparency required by this standard is likely to come at a price and the danger is that it could be one that SMEs in particular may be ill-able to afford.

As ever, the devil is in the detail, which is why this consultation is so important. If we get it right then businesses will have a golden opportunity to become more strategic about health and safety. But, get it wrong and supply chain SMEs in particular could end up paying a steep price.

Mike Denison, HSS lead at EEF, the manufacturers’ organisation