Help Overview

Act  (Section /Sub-Section)

An Act is a piece of HSE legislation. Each Act can be divided into Sections and each Section may have Sub-Sections e.g. Section 2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974.

Activity

        See Main Work Activity

Back

The back button allows you to step back through the screens one step at a time.

 

Breach

When an Act or Regulation is broken, this is regarded as a Breach. Each breach is heard in court and is given a result.

Case

Case refers to a prosecution against a single defendant. The defendant may be an individual person or a company. There may be one or more breaches of health and safety legislation associated with each case.

Case Number

The unique number assigned to the Case by HSE's computer systems.

 

Case Summary

See Summary.

 

Condition

The AND, OR and NOT conditions are used on Advanced Search. Please note: the examples given below are for finding Cases, but the conditions can be used in the same way to find Breaches:-

AND allows you to include another search criteria in the search, but all items must be present in the Case Details for it to appear in the Hitlist.

E.g. Searching for Cases where the Defendant is "Botary Ltd" AND the Location of the Offence was "Aberdeen", would return 1 Case, i.e.; 

1. Case A1 where an employee of Botary Ltd fell off a ladder in Aberdeen.

OR allows you to include another search criteria in the search, but only one criteria must be present in the Case Details for it to appear in the Hitlist.

E.g. Searching for Cases where the Defendant is "Botary Ltd" OR the Location of the Offence was "Aberdeen", would return 3 Cases; 

1. Case A1, where an employee of Botary Ltd fell off a ladder in Aberdeen,
2. Case A2, where an employee of Botary Ltd fell off a ladder in London and 
3. Case A3, where an employee of ACME Ltd was injured in Aberdeen

E.g. Searching for Cases where the Defendant is "Botary Ltd" AND the Location of the Offence was "London" OR the Location of the Offence was "Aberdeen", would also return 3 Cases; 

1. Case A1, where an employee of Botary Ltd fell off a ladder in Aberdeen,
2. Case A2, where an employee of Botary Ltd fell off a ladder in London and 
3. Case A3, where an employee of ACME Ltd was injured in Aberdeen

Please Note; If you want to find all Cases where the Defendant was "Botary Ltd" and the Location of the Offence was either "Aberdeen" or "London" then use the following example:-

E.g. Searching for Cases where the Defendant is "Botary Ltd" AND the Location of the Offence was "London" OR the Defendant is "Botary Ltd" AND the Location of the Offence was "Aberdeen", would only return 2 Cases; 

1. Case A1, where an employee of Botary Ltd fell off a ladder in Aberdeen and
2. Case A2, where an employee of Botary Ltd fell off a ladder in London 

As you can see the ACME Ltd Case - A3 does not appear in the results, as the search criteria "Defendant is "Botary Ltd"" appears before and after the OR statement and therefore this criteria must be true in all the results. 

NOT allows you to exclude a search criteria from the search, where the criteria must NOT be present in the Case Details for it to appear in the Hitlist

E.g. Searching for Cases where the Defendant is "Botary Ltd" and the Location of the Offence was NOT "Aberdeen", would return at 1 Case; 

1. Case A2, where an employee of Botary Ltd fell off a ladder in London.

 

 

Country

Country is used within the Geographical Search and Advanced Search and can be one of three; England, Scotland and Wales.

 

Court Level

Identifies the level of the Court at which the hearing of a Case took place.   There are nine levels of Court and they are; Court of Appeal, Coroners Court, Crown Court, Divisional Court, High Court of Justiciary, House of Lords, Magistrates Court, Sheriff Court and Solemn Procedure. 

 

Court Name

The Name of the Court where the Case was heard

 

Current Search Criteria

When building an Advanced Search, each criteria is listed in the Current Search Criteria area. At any point you can see Results based on the current criteria listed, by using the Go button.   If you wish to start entering the criteria again, you can use the Start Again button, which will clear the Current Search Criteria area, so you can start a new Advanced Search.

Date of Hearing

The actual date that the Hearing of the Case took place.  Date is in the format DD/MM/YYYY, where;

 

DD is the Day e.g. 25, 

MM is the Month e.g. 07 and 

YYYY is the year e.g. 2000

 

Defendant or Defendant's Name

The name of the Defendant.  When an Act or Regulation has been breached, the entity who has responsibilities under Health and Safety Law, is the Defendant. 

Defendant Status

The status of the Defendant, according to pre-defined categories:

 

Type	Description
Individual	A self employed person or an individual who has responsibilities under the Health and Safety at work Act 1974.
Sole Proprietor	Sole Proprietor
Limited Company	Limited Company
Employee	Employee
Private Company	Any incorporated company whether limited (by shares or guarantee) or unlimited. Public limited companies are included.
Partnership	Any number of individual partners trading as a partnership, probably with a trading name.
Local Authority	District, town, city, county, or metropolitan councils, and any other form of local government.
Central Government	Government departments eg Ministry of Defence, Department of Transport, Social Security.
National Health Service	NHS bodies, irrespective of funding arrangements, and including NHS Trusts.
Other	All other client types
Public Limited Company (plc)	A Public Limited Company under British law.
Agricultural Research	Agriculural Research

Fatality

Prosecution cases which resulted from the 'investigation' of a fatality. 

During an investigation of a fatality an HSE inspector may find that the company or individual is breaching other health and safety acts or regulations, therefore the prosecution breach may not be directly related to the incident which caused the fatality.

 

Fine

The amount the defendant was fined by the court.

Hearing Date

See Date of Hearing.

 

Hearing Result

See Result

 

Home Page

The first page of a web site, which usually provides a description of the web site including a contents list.

 

 

HSE Directorate

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) is divided up into four major areas of inspection and they are: 

 

FOD	Field Operations Directorate
HID	Hazardous Installations Directorate*
ND	Nuclear Directorate
FWS	Flexible Warrant Scheme**

* Incorporates Offshore Division, Chemical Industries & Specialised Industries

** Enforcement by Local Authority inspectors under warrant from HSE

 

HSE Division

 

HSE Division is an area of Great Britain as defined by the HSE.  Each HSE Area Office will sit within a HSE Division.  There are seven HSE Divisions and they are;

 

Scotland

Yorkshire and North East

North West

Midlands

Wales and West

London and the South East

Home Counties

HSE Group

HSE Group is the management unit which took the prosecution case.

Industry

The type of Industry where the Offence occurred. This is based on the main economic activity of the defendant. The industry categories are:

 

Agriculture, Hunting, Forestry and Fishing

Construction

Extractive and Utility Supply

Manufacturing

Services

Local Authority

Local Authority in whose area the offence occurred.

Note! It's not always possible to pin-point the local authority for Rail related offences.
Prosecution Cases/Breaches prefixed with 'O' were taken by HSE's Offshore Division. Where the offence took place OFF-SHORE (E.g. Location Type - Diving Support Vessel (DSV)) it is difficult to pin-point the actual location of the offence, therefore the Local Authority relates to the Defendant's 'on-shore' address.

For ON-SHORE offences (E.g. Location Types - Inshore Diving, Onshore Well Site or Other Location) the Local Authority relates to the location of the offence.

 

 

Location of Offence

Address, Region, Local Authority, Industry, Main Activity where the offence occurred.

 

Location Type

Identifies the type of Location where the offence took place.

Click here for the list of Location Types.

Main Work Activity

The Main Economic Activity where the offence occurred. Each activity has an associated activity code . These activities are also known as Standard Industrial Classifiations (SIC).

 

Click here for the list of Work Activities (SICs)

 

The hierarchy is also illustrated on the industry search page

Non-Compliance with an Improvement Notice

Identifies whether a prosecution breach for a given case was the result of non compliance with the requirements of an improvement notice served on the defendant.

Offence Date

The date the first offence took place.

Operands

The <, > and = operands are used as follows:-

"<", when used with dates means before, 

E.g. < 2000  - before the Year 2000, excludes 2000, but includes 1999

E.g. < 11/2000  - before November 2000, excludes November and December 2000 and any date after, but includes January to October 2000 and all of 1999

"<", when used with amounts means less than, 

E.g. < £100,000 - less than £100,000

">", when used with dates means after, 

E.g. > 1999  - after the Year 1999, excludes 1999, but includes 2000 and all subsequent years

E.g. > 11/2000  - after November 2000, excludes November 2000, but includes December 2000 and all subsequent years

">", when used with amounts means greater than, 

E.g. > £100,000 - greater than £100,000

"=", when used with dates means equal to, 

E.g. = 2000  - equal to Year 2000, excludes 1999, 2001 and all subsequent years

E.g. = 11/1999  - equal to November 1999, excludes October 1999 and all previous months, also excludes December 1999 and all subsequent months.

"=", when used with amounts means equal to, 

E.g. = £100,000 - equal to £100,000, must be the exact amount.

Paragraph Number

See Regulation

Region

A Region is an area within Great Britain.  Region is used within the Geographical Search.  There are eleven Regions recognised by the HSE and they are;

 

Scotland

North East

North West

East Midlands

West Midlands

York & Humberside

Wales

South East

South West

Eastern

London

 

Regulation

A Regulation is a piece of HSE legislation. Each Regulation has a regulation number and a paragraph. e.g. The Agriculture (Avoidance of Accidents to Children) Regulations, Reg No. 003,  Para. 01.

Click here for the list of Regulations.

Result

The result of the hearing with regard to a particular breach. The results are:

 

	Guilty Absolute Discharge
	Guilty Admonished (Scotland)
	Guilty Conditional Discharge
	Guilty Conditional Discharge/Order
	Guilty Fine
	Guilty Fine/Order Made
	Guilty Imprisonment
	Guilty Imprisonment/Order Made
	Guilty Fine/Imprisonment
	Guilty Fine/Imprisonment/Order
	Guilty Community Sentence
	Guilty Order Made
	Guilty No Separate Penalty

 

Resulting from a Fatality

See Fatality

 

Section / Sub-section

See Act

 

Standard Industrial Classification SIC)

See Main Work Activity

 

Status

See Defendant Status

 

Summary

A brief text description of the Case

Toolbar

The area at the top of the screen that contains icons for performing different functions.

 

Total Costs Awarded to HSE

The amount of costs awarded to HSE by the Court

 

Total Fine

The amount the court fined the Defendant, for the overall Case, this is the sum of all the fines for all the Breaches associated with the Case.

 

Type of Location

See Location Type

 

UK Region

See Region