With many seasonal jobs being filled at this time of year, it is important that employers protect the health and safety of gig economy, agency and temporary workers.
Workers are as likely to have an accident in their first 6 months at work as during the whole of the rest of their working life.
We have further advice around protecting those who are new to the job, including 6 ways to protect new starters.
Our website has guidance to help users and suppliers of agency and temporary workers understand their health and safety responsibilities.
If you are an agency or temporary worker your health and safety is protected by law and employment businesses (agencies) have a duty to make sure they follow it.
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An operations manager at a funfair company has been jailed for 6 months and disqualified as a director for 5 years after a 3-year-old girl died.
The inflatable trampoline the child had been playing on exploded, ejecting her high into the air.
HSE's investigation found the operations manager, on behalf of the company, had imported the inflatable trampoline into the UK from China in 2017 and had put it into use without carrying out any of the required testing and certification to ensure it was safe to be used by the public.
The funfair company the manager was working for has also been fined £20,000.
Read this press release for further details on the incident.
HSE's website has guidance on Sealed inflatables: safe supply, inspection and operation.
Other recent prosecution cases include:
15 November was World Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) Day.
COPD describes a number of breathing problems where there is damage to the breathing tubes and air sacs within the lung.
Breathing in dusts, fumes, chemicals or gases in the workplace may cause serious, long-term lung damage. This includes exposure to respirable crystalline silica (RCS) released into the air when handling sand and cutting stone, brick or tiles.
We have further information on COPD and advice for employers and workers to protect respiratory health on our Dust Kills campaign website.
In addition, HSE's website has further guidance and resources on COPD available.
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HSE has issued a safety alert following several instances where non-destructive testing has been falsified.
In particular, radiographic images of welds have been falsely obtained or tampered with, including:
- duplicate images of welds and false identification numbers added after processing
- suspected accelerated working by shortening the distance to the radiographic source
- potential misrepresentation of image quality
- images cropped to remove defects in adjacent welds
In these cases there is a significant risk of flaws and defects going undetected, with a subsequent risk of structural failure.
View the safety alert
We currently have a variety of opportunities to join HSE.
Find out more and apply:
Visit our website for further information and more vacancies.
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