Explosives legislative review (ELR)

HSE is working with other regulators and the explosives sector to review all health and safety explosives legislation, with the aim of reducing the regulatory burden on business through clarification and simplification.

The review will deliver an integrated and modernised suite of legislation and guidance in 2014, reducing the burden on business and providing a sound legislative foundation for the explosives sector of the future.

Why review explosives legislation?

Explosives legislation has grown over time leading to a fragmented set of requirements with multiple sets of regulations and subsequent amendments, which has led to an increase in regulatory burden.

What legislation is being reviewed?

The main elements are:

• Explosives Act 1875
• Classification and Labelling of Explosives Regulations 1983 (CLER)
• Dangerous Substances in Harbour Areas Regulations 1987
• Control of Explosives Regulations 1991 (COER)
• Placing on the Market and Supervision of Transfers of Explosives Regulations 1993 (POMSTER)
• Marking of Plastic Explosives for Detection Regulations 1996
• Manufacture and Storage of Explosives Regulations 2005 (MSER)
• Identification and Traceability of Explosives Regulations 2010 (ITOER)

Benefits of the review will include:

• Reducing the regulatory burden by effective integration and amalgamation of the numerous orders and amending regulations into clarified and simplified legislation and guidance
• Delivering ‘fit for purpose’ legislation and guidance by involving industry and regulators jointly throughout all stages in the development
• Allowing existing outstanding work on explosives legislation to be dealt with more efficiently by co-ordinating it with other work within the review

Further information

If you wish to keep up to date with the progress of the review, you can do so by joining the ELR online community. Access to the community is by invitation only but anyone can apply to join by emailing their name, contact details and a brief note on their interest in the explosives sector to ELR@hse.gsi.gov.uk