Diversity - Vulnerable workers/employees

Factors like race, gender, disability, age and work pattern may affect people's health and safety - and sometimes health and safety is used as an excuse to justify discriminating against certain groups of workers. It's important to take account of diversity and involve people when assessing risk and managing health and safety.

A number of workplace enforcement agencies, including HSE, use the term 'vulnerable workers' to describe those who are at risk of having their workplace entitlements denied, and who lack the capacity or means to secure them. This group can include, among others, many migrant workers, those who are not confident expressing themselves in English, young/inexperienced workers, those new to the job, and agency/temporary workers.

• Race and migrant workers
• Gender
• Disability
• Age

Vulnerable workers and the risk of accidents

Vulnerable (including migrant and temporary) workers: key issues

There is increasing evidence that workers new to the job/workplace face a higher risk of accidents and ill-health. Employers should make sure there is adequate induction, training, supervision and communications to protect them.

Recent detailed analysis of investigated accidents to migrant/foreign workers (fatal and selected non-fatal) in the construction sector reinforces wider evidence from the Labour Force Survey (LFS) on risk/vulnerability in the early months of a job:

• Eight out of 16 fatal accidents happened during the first ten days on site, half of them on the very first day.
• Only two of those who died had been in the UK a year or more.
• Only three of the ten migrant workers killed were known to have any experience of the UK construction industry – none of the injured were known to have any.
• The pattern of accidents (by type) is broadly the same as that for other workers in the sector.

Together with the wider LFS evidence suggesting a doubled risk of injury in the first six months of employment, this highlights the need for:

• checking that suitable and sufficient assessment of the risks to the workers has been carried out. Employers should take particular account of levels of experience, familiarity with the work being done and the working environment (especially where conditions change rapidly, such as on construction sites), and cultural and language issuesas possible aggravating factors;
• assessing whether workers have been given necessary, relevant and comprehensible information about risks, and that steps have been taken to ensure it’s been understood and is acted upon;
• checking the effectiveness ofinduction, training and supervision in ensuring workers are safe and protected from risks to health in the vital first days/weeks in the job;
• verifying that workers are properly supervised, can communicate effectively with their supervisor/manager, and know how and with whom they can raise any concerns about health and safety.

Workers do not have to pay for personal protective equipment

Some vulnerable workers (especially temporary/agency workers) are being made to pay for personal protective equipment (PPE) needed to protect against a workplace risk. Where PPE is required because the risk cannot be removed or lessened in any other way, it must be provided free of charge, either by the employment business or the business hiring the worker (a returnable deposit also counts as a charge). The cost of PPE not returned by a worker at the end of a contract can be deducted from final wages, provided this is made clear in writing when the worker first gets the PPE.

• Personal Protective Equipment Regulations 1992 [PDF 142KB]