Agenda item

Mr Andrew Bilingham (BDO) presented the report and advised that the review of the Council’s Health and Safety (H&S) had been undertaken. It was noted that the review only covered certain aspects of H&S which had been agreed with the Council prior to the review taking place. The report set out the areas reviewed, along with areas of good practice. A number of improvements which had been identified and set out along with the detailed findings and management response.

The Assistant Director – Customer Services and Operations then read out a statement in response to this audit. She explained that the Council had chosen areas of H&S where it was known further work was required and which could be progressed based on the recommendations in the audit report. The Audit report gave an independent view on where the risks were, and the work required to resolve them. She reported that a large amount of this work was already underway and would continue through an audit action plan to achieve the deadlines stated in the report. The Assistant Director reminded Members of the quarterly H&S reports received by this Committee and reassured them that a lot of work was continuing to ensure the Council improved its H&S compliance. A ‘meet the service’ event was being organised and would give opportunity for Members to attend, meet Officers and find out more about the work that was being done in this area. She thanked the Corporate Health and Safety Manager for his hard work and cooperation with this audit.

In response to some concern raised, the Corporate Health and Safety Manager (the Manager) provided Members with detailed information on the work undertaken to update policies, including risk assessments and management involvement. He reported that going forward every Health and Safety policy had a Working Group and owner assigned to it. It was noted that a training matrix had also been established.

In response to questions, the Manager provided explanation for the delay in the review of the Council’s overarching Health and Safety policy. The Chairperson then proposed that the Committee received the draft Health and Safety Policy in order to review it on a performance basis. This was agreed.

In respect of inspections, Members were advised that Officers would firstly carry out inspections, for example on a monthly basis, and the Manager follow this up with a more in-depth inspection on an annual basis. Guidance would be provided to Officers on the frequency of their regular reviews along with any recommendations identified.

The Assistant Director clarified that in respect of Risk 7, the Council would be implementing a basic standard checklist which would apply to every event, although depending on the type of event, additional requirements may be added. In response to a request from the Chairperson for this information to be brought back to the Committee, the Assistant Director advised the quarterly report to the Committee in January could be expanded to include details regarding this.

The Chairperson then thanked the Corporate Health and Safety Manager.