Health and Safety
Executive / Commission
Simplification plan
The ABME was a government-wide exercise, carried out to provide an indication of the administrative burden on industry created by regulations. It estimated the cost associated with complying with administrative tasks (form filling, record keeping, etc) and so gauged the total annual administrative cost contained in all legislation in force in May 2005. A list of health and safety legislation that has been introduced subsequently is attached in annex 1.
The ABME provided HSE with an estimated total baseline figure of £2.03 billion[1]. HSC/E have given a commitment to work towards a 25% target reduction in administrative burdens by May 2010. HSE is therefore aiming to make a reduction of £508 million on our 2005 baseline.
The ABME identified ten sets of regulations that account for 77% of HSE’s total annual costs figure.
The 10 regulations are:
| Regulation | Top costing administrative elements |
|---|---|
| Management of Health & Safety at Work Regulations 1999 | Risk management and risk assessment. |
| Gas Safety (Installation and Use) Regulations 1998 | Landlords’ gas safety check |
| Lifting Operations & Lifting Equipment Regulations 1998 | Checking and recording examinations of equipment |
| Control of Substances Hazardous to Health Regulations 2002 | Risk assessment Employee training and maintaining records of training |
| Manual Handling Operations Regulations 1992 | Risk assessment Information to employees |
| Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974 | Health and safety policy statement Health and safety information to employees |
| Control of Asbestos at Work Regulations 2002 | Compiling information on emergency arrangements for the emergency services |
| Safety representatives and Safety Committees Regulations 1977 | Providing information to safety representatives to enable them to fulfil their functions |
| Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 1994 | Preparing rules for management of health and safety for construction jobs. Updating the health and safety file and delivering it to client on completion of job |
| Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998 | Checking and recording examinations of equipment |
In reaching its target reduction, HSE is taking into account any additional costs created by new legislation that comes into effect over the period of the plan (listed in annex 1).
HSC/E’s simplification plan is a rolling programme, to be updated as it progresses, with new initiatives being added and old ones coming to an end. This, the 2007 plan, details projects that, if successful, are designed to address almost 90% of the administrative burden reduction target. HSE is continuing to seek initiatives that will add to this reduction, to help deliver the full target.
In each subsequent year HSC/E’s simplification plan will assess what reduction in administrative costs has been achieved and what new initiatives are possible.
Many of the largest burdens are where the requirement applies to all businesses and the cost to individual dutyholders is quite small. Another subset of the highest cost administrative burdens consists of requirements to provide information to third parties, such as employees. Giving sufficient information to others to help them look after their own health and safety is a fundamental element of health and safety policy in the UK.
“As a main simplification measure, HSE is seeking to provide more straightforward information and guidance to provide greater clarity and reduce complexity. This matches the type of measures that businesses cited [in the NAO survey] as important in improving their experience of complying with health and safety law.”
National Audit Office
Administrative burdens report
July 2007
In general, occupational health and safety regulations do not specify a required format for this information. Instead, HSE has adopted a goal-setting approach, requiring the dutyholder to provide suitable and sufficient information, without dictating how they provide it. Often it is the interpretation of the legal requirements (by the business themselves, their advisors, or others) that results in high administrative expenditure on compliance, rather than the law itself.
HSE is, therefore, focussing its efforts on simplifications and other initiatives that will make a significant difference to dutyholders, even where this is not reflected in a large numerical reduction in the administrative burden as it was measured. One example of this is the range of culture-change work HSE is doing both internally and with Local Authorities. This includes ‘Better Policy Making’ seminars for HSE policy staff run by the Better Regulation Team and the Economic Advisers Unit, the Local Authority Partnership Programme and HSE’s SME Information, Advice and Guidance Project. There are more details on all of these initiatives in the section on wider better regulation initiatives. Another example is the new Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2007 - deliberately developed on better regulation principles, to reduce administrative costs on business, even though these were not included in the ABME.