How to trace legislation

Help from HSE

If you want to know which legislation relates to your industry, there are a few ways to find this out:

• Some of our industry and topic sites have a specific legislation section and we hope to introduce this as a standard feature across all sites
• The lists of Acts and Statutory Instruments can be sorted alphabetically by title and can be used to identify relevant legislation
• The search engine can also be used to trace legal information

If you are also interested in the general legislation that applies to all working environments you may want to:

• visit the Getting started site which provides basic information
• explore the Workers site which explains the range of rights and responsiblities that affect employees
• check out the Businesses site which describes legal responsibilities of companies and the benefits that good health and safety practices can bring.

hsedirect is a subscription-based service that you can use to identify and access the full text of HSE guidance publications and consolidated legislation.

Amendments to existing regulations are also subject to a consultation process. You can find out about them from the sources above and from the Current consultations and discussions area.

If you have an enquiry that relates to a particular regulation or is about a legal matter relevant to workplace health and safety, you can use our Ask an Expert service via HSE’S Infoline

External sources

There are many sources, both free and priced that will enable you to trace Acts and regulations. The following selection may prove useful:

• The Statute Law Database covers primary legislation in force at 1 st February 1991 and the primary and secondary legislation that has been produced since that date. The primary legislation has been revised to 2002 and it expected to be completely up do date with revisions by 2008. In the meantime, a Table of Effects for 2002 will help users to check the currency on any primary legislation selected.
• The House of Commons Information Office produces two Factsheets that provide detailed information on the UK legal system:
  • Statutory Instruments (Factsheet L7 Legislation Series)
  • Tracing Acts of Parliament (Factsheet L12 Legislation Series)
• European legislation can be traced on the EUR-Lex website. This site provides full-text access to European legislation, case law and treaties. It also includes the full text of the Official Journal of the European Communities and Tenders Electronic Daily.
• Scottish Law Online provides an A-Z of Scottish law and has links to company and European law as well as universities with legal collections and legal publishers.
• LexisNexis is a priced subscription service giving access to a wide range of legal resources from the legal publishing company Butterworths Tolley.
• Westlaw has a large collection of legal material, provides legal commentary and also includes news and business information. This is a priced service.