More than a decade of funding cuts have put the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) under “considerable financial pressure” to achieve efficiencies, whilst carrying out its role as the official health and safety regulator.
Appearing at a Work and Pensions Select Committee on 5 February, HSE chair Sarah Newton answered questions from Members of Parliament about how it ensures value for taxpayers’ money.
The Government’s contribution to the HSE’s budget has been cut significantly since 2010. Sarah Newton told MPs that these cuts forced the regulator to find £100 million in savings over this period. This was despite the “significantly expanded” remit of its activities, including post-Brexit chemical regulation, and policing building safety after the Grenfell disaster.
HSE chief executive Sarah Albon told MPs that local authorities and HSE had been “under considerable financial pressure”, but that the health and safety regulator has “achieved the efficiencies” it set out to achieve.
“As with all parts of the public sector, there’s a lot more we’d like to do if we were able and funded to do that,” said Albon.
She added that finances “remain challenging for us”, and the fact that HSE is funded through three separate government departments “leads to complexities”. However, said Albon, “we remain very committed to ensuring we get the best value out of the money we have”.
British Safety Council chief executive Mike Robinson raised his concerns before the Select Committee meeting, underlining the importance of a well-funded health and safety regulator:
“This very real funding cut does not reflect the material additions to HSE’s workload, nor does it reflect the scale of the challenges that the future holds,” said Robinson.
“We know that the future will be defined by rapid change that will likely have profound impacts on workplace safety. From technology and AI to the changing nature of how and where we work, the challenges our sector faces are both important and varied.”
Albon was questioned on the 30% drop in the number of HSE inspections, and an increase in the cost per inspection. She acknowledged this was “partly accurate”, although the regulator has been “shifting more resources” into preventing catastrophes at major hazard sites “as budgets have been squeezed”.
Responding to a question alluding to a 30 per cent drop in the number of HSE inspections and an increase in the cost per inspection, Albon said this was “partly accurate”.
She also pointed to a “significant period” a decade ago when a hiring freeze prevented HSE from recruiting inspectors – something it is still recovering from. Filling those vacancies has placed a “training burden” on HSE’s experienced inspectors and has been “a drain on our ability to do as much productive work as we’d want to do”.
“We have undoubtedly had to recover from recruitment freezes,” said Albon, adding that “the proportion of really experienced to less experienced [inspectors] is not where we’d want it to be”.
Despite these challenges, Albon said: “We’ll see improving productivity this year, next year and for the foreseeable future. We’re in an upward trend now.”
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Peninsula Team, Peninsula Team
(Last updated )
Peninsula Team, Peninsula Team
(Last updated )
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