How to cope with a health & safety incident

02/07/2011

By Nick Horton, Partner and Head of Dispute Resolution. First published in Kent Business in July 2011.

Many of Kent's businesses are in sectors that are high risk from a health & safety point of view - for example farming, construction and storage and distribution. This article looks at what to do if the worst comes to the worst and your business experiences a serious health & safety incident. Here are 10 top tips for coping with the immediate aftermath: 

1. Shut down operations and ensure that no-one else's safety is put at risk. 

2. Follow your emergency procedures and do your utmost to assist injured people with the assistance of the emergency services. 

3. Report the incident under RIDDOR. 

4. Ensure that no evidence is tampered with - for example leave parts of broken machinery where they are. 

5. Co-operate fully with the health & safety authorities - this article assumes the HSE. They will wish to interview employees, take photographs and samples and seal the site etc.

6. Take statements yourself from key witnesses; if you do not do so, you may find that the first time you know what your employees have said is after a prosecution has been commenced.

7. Call your EL / PL insurers. If you are not sure whether you have H&S defence costs cover that includes investigatory work, it may be better to call specialist lawyers direct and incur those costs before insurers have confirmed cover.

8. Ensure that you do not hand over documents to the HSE without being sure that they are entitled to them. Are your accident investigation reports, for example, drafted for the dominant purpose of obtaining legal advice? If so they should be capable of being withheld.

9. Prepare wording for a press statement - this should be neutral, express regret that the incident has occurred and state that you are cooperating fully with the HSE's investigation.

10. Do not agree to attend an interview under caution without first seeking legal advice on (a) whether to attend at all and (b) what you should say at such an interview or instead in a written statement endorsed with a caution.