The UK's Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has published "Health and Safety Training: What you need to know for employers" and "Effective Health and Safety Training: a trainer's resource pack."
These new publications will help employers and trainers provide effective health and safety training for their employees. The guidance covers all employers, but will be particularly useful to small firms.
"Employers have a legal and moral responsibility for the health and safety of their work force and effective training throughout the organization is central to this," said Timothy Walker, HSE's general director. "Most health and safety failures are avoidable. They are due to poor management and ignorance of good practice."
Employers, along with workers, are key to driving up standards and improving the working environment, according to Walker. "This new guidance will give exactly the kind of help employers and trainers need to meet their health and safety responsibilities effectively - and to avoid the considerable cost of not doing so," he added.
The free leaflet "Health and Safety Training: What you need to know" provides pointers to employers about who needs health and safety
training, how training can be delivered, brief guidance on the law and advice about where to find further information.
"Effective Health and Safety Training: A trainer's resource pack" provides trainers with everything they need to give the right health and safety messages. It could be particularly useful for any small firms which want to provide in-house training. It is in a loose-leaf format, so that parts of it can be photocopied as handouts or used with overhead projection equipment during training exercises. It is divided into five steps:
- How to decide who needs training, including an activity selector to choose appropriate training activities.
- How to decide training priorities by tackling top priorities first and discussing and agreeing the priorities with colleagues.
- How to choose training methods, including numbers of trainees and the amount of time required.
- How to deliver training, including how to prepare both yourself and activities; tailoring training to your company; the resources needed; choosing a venue and techniques for getting people involved.
- How to check, in both the short and long term, that training is working, including evaluation forms.
Both publications can be ordered online at www.hsebooks.co.uk.
edited by Sandy Smith