Health And Safety Law

[Iggle Piggle]

Does anyone know if a company is breaking Health and Safety laws by employing staff members who do not speak sufficient English to be safe in an emergency? There is a worrying amount of staff who just vanish if an accident occurs for fear of being asked questions they are unable to answer and/or understand.

[Old_Geezer]

If things are that bad one might suspect more than H&S laws being broken ?

[boxtops]

Well, staff have to be able to read the policies and confirm they've read and understood them, and can take action if necessary, know how to fill in an accident book etc. How can people understand their employee obligations (unless of course your company policies are available in several languages)?

[Zacs-Master]

Are you sure they're directly employed by the company?

[New Judge]

So the answer is do not emply anybody who cannot speak English.

Good luck to your employer with that !!!

[Peter Pedant]

hasnt been tried as far as I know...

// // There is a worrying amount of staff who just vanish if an accident occurs //
where I used to work: some of the English used to vanish when there were emergencies and they f course had early warning because they spoke the language....

[bert_h]

There would be a difference of opinion over whether those employees' standard of English was good enough or not. If the employer's defence to a H&S charge was "We think it's good enough", it would be difficult to lead enough evidence to persuade a court to conclude otherwise. Regrettably, the issue can only be tested AFTER an emergency, when there would be distressing facts to support a charge under H&S law.

[Svejk]

building sites are crammed with people who cant speak 1 word of English. Curiously, they must have obtained all the safety certificates one needs to set foot on site, today. Even worse than the language barrier is the surfeit of people who've never set foot on a site before.(no understanding of safety matters)

[Peter Pedant]

After around 24 h thought - this is the sort of case that comes up.
http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/doctor-who-injected-poison-into-4-year-old-688832

at the very bottom:
"We feel vindicated that the GMC made these decisions after we referred him to them when the trust didn’t.”
and part of the back-story was that the employer [trust] was well aware it was a systems error - I think there was only one English speaker present at the time - and this came out very strongly in the third day of the GMC case which was by and large unreported by the media, [ Bad foreign doctor IS news ; completely crap hospital system like another Staffs is NOT news ]


Part of the oral testimony, was that when he asked for Phenol, the Asian nurse knew they didnt have any so gave him some Drano which for some reason had been stored in a drug cupboard. It was further shown in the unreported day, that the hospital management were aware that communications were weak.

and yes there was a later HSE prosecution - over the storage of the drano.

all in the public domain... I was having chemo in the same trust during all this ....