Universities across the UK aren’t “merely” employers, or “just” providers of educational environments – they are both. It should be unsurprising, then, that such institutions are subject to a complex framework of health and safety legislation, regulations, and guidelines.
A wide range of measures will therefore typically be required at a university. These will encompass risk assessments, the development of emergency procedures, and other steps to help keep students, staff, visitors, and contractors safe.
Below, we have put the spotlight on the essentials of a typical UK university’s health and safety obligations, and how they can achieve – and maintain – compliance.
What are the legal requirements for health and safety in UK universities?
It is difficult to speak for long about health and safety compliance in UK universities, without touching on the framework the below legislation puts in place:
- The Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 (HASWA)
This legislation imposes general duties on universities to ensure the health, safety, and welfare of their employees, students, and anyone else impacted by their activities.Obligations under this law include the assessment of risks, the implementation of preventative measures, and the provision of adequate information, training, and supervision.
- The Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999 (MHSWR)
Under these regulations, universities have certain specific duties as employers. These regulations are applicable to all aspects of a university’s operations, including teaching, research, and general safety in the workplace.In accordance with MSHWR, universities are expected to conduct risk assessments to pick out potential hazards. They must also provide employees with relevant information about workplace hazards, and establish safe working practices.
How are corporate and individual responsibilities assigned across key people?
There are various levels of responsibility within a UK university. All of them have important roles to play in ensuring the highest standards of health and safety on campus:
- Governing bodies
Serving as a UK university’s governing body is its Board of Governors, which acts as the supreme authority within the institution.It is the Board of Governors that has overall responsibility for university health and safety as the employer. It is this layer of authority at the university that will need to hold senior leaders accountable. Furthermore, the Board of Governors will need to ensure health and safety policies are implemented and reviewed regularly.
- Senior leadership
The high-ranking individuals who make up a UK university’s senior leadership team – typically including the Vice-Chancellor and Pro-Vice-Chancellors – will be accountable for the institution’s compliance with health and safety legislation.Senior leaders will also need to make sure the university’s health and safety management systems are effective.
- Heads of department
Department heads, too, are key figures as far as the maintenance of health and safety at a university is concerned.Such individuals are responsible for the management of health and safety within their specific areas. They must ensure that university-level health and safety policies and procedures are complied with, and they will need to identify and manage the risks that their department’s activities might present.
What makes health and safety compliance especially challenging in universities?
There is a combination of factors that can add to the challenge and complexity involved in the maintenance of health and safety compliance at a university.
These include:
- Decentralised management structures and siloed departments – A given university may operate across multiple campuses, with the management arrangements being somewhat decentralised. This can make it a more complicated process to coordinate healthy and safety efforts across what may be many different sites and departments – there will be a need for clearly assigned responsibilities and constant communication.
- High staff and student turnover – It is in the very nature of a university that the population of staff and students will be both large and constantly changing. It can therefore be a challenging process to ensure a consistently high level of safety training and awareness.
- Diverse and evolving research environments – A broad array of research projects take place under the banner of a particular university, from laboratory-based science to fieldwork. With research environments constantly changing, there is a need for regular risk assessments and updates to safety protocols.
- Fieldwork, overseas placements, and varied physical spaces – With staff and students constantly moving within and across a range of physical spaces, both within and beyond the university campus, there can be scope for a diverse range of hazards to arise, such as chemical exposures, ergonomic issues, and psychosocial risks, such as stress.
- Financial pressures and resistance to procedural change – Both financial resources and staff time are typically required in order to implement procedural changes at a university, such as to health and safety processes – and those resources can often be in short supply. Funding constraints at an institution may limit its flexibility to fund safety measures such as disability adjustments.
How should universities structure their health and safety management systems?
At this stage, it is worth reminding ourselves exactly what a health and safety management system, or HSMS, is. It can be defined as the structured approach that an organisation follows in order to pinpoint, manage, and reduce health and safety risks in the workplace.
As you seek to structure your university’s health and safety management systems effectively, we would urge you to consult the UK Health and Safety Executive (HSE)’s Managing for health and safety document, under the HSG65 series code. A free PDF copy of this publication can be downloaded from the HSE website.
This document’s importance is largely because it sets out the “Plan, Do, Check, Act” approach. Knowledge of this cycle will assist university managers with the implementation of systematic health and safety arrangements.
The policy that you develop for your university will need to encompass:
- An overarching health and safety (H&S) policy
- Topic-specific sub-policies, including in relation to fire safety, fieldwork, and the management of contractors
The structure of your university’s health and safety management systems will also need to incorporate such elements as:
- Risk assessments and control implementation
- Consultation mechanisms with staff and trade unions
- Arrangements for training, recordkeeping, and the monitoring of performance.
What are the key components of an effective university compliance system?
The following are all typical features of an effective health and safety compliance system at a university:
- Clearly assigned roles and responsibilities
- A high level of staff competency and continuous training
- Incident and near-miss reporting
- The tracking of assets and maintenance processes
- Regulatory documentation and version control
- Audit trails and data protection standards, such as ISO 27001 for information security.
How can Vision Pro Software support university health and safety compliance?
Here are some of the ways in which our own cloud-based Vision Pro Software can support a UK university’s efforts to stay on the right side of health and safety regulations:
- Centralised compliance platform – Vision Pro Software allows for a unified view across an institution’s departments, estates, and campuses. This is made possible by real-time dashboards designed for the quick and easy tracking of audits, incidents, and assets.
- Audit management module – Users will also find within Vision Pro Software, configurable templates that are aligned with the likes of the PAS 79 fire risk assessment framework and COSHH (Control of Substances Hazardous to Health) regulations.
The audit management module within our platform also supports the gathering of digital evidence and the setting of corrective action plans. It offers online audit capability, too.
- Asset and risk management – With this part of our Vision Pro Software, live asset records can be easily maintained, using Near Field Communication (NFC) and RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) technology and GPS tags. Integration with CAD maps, as well as automated alerts, further help ensure smooth health and safety compliance.
- Document management – Vision Pro Software supports various file types, with versioning and expiry notifications.
- Mobile functionality – Authorised users are able to access and take advantage of Vision Pro Software through their mobile devices. Relevant functionality encompasses support for offline inspections, as well as geotagged reports and the instant flagging of hazards.
- Training and competency tracking – You can help ensure your university’s relevant personnel keep their knowledge and skills up to date, thanks to how Vision Pro Software enables role-specific training access. Our platform also incorporates performance-linked prompts to arrange refresher training.
- Demonstrating due diligence – With its automated reporting functionality and audit-ready logs, Vision Pro Software can be invaluable to a university’s efforts to make sure it is always well-prepared for HSE inspections.
How can universities maximise the benefits of digital compliance tools like Vision Pro Software?
To ensure your university gains the greatest possible value from its investment in risk compliance software and other digital tools, make sure you do the following:
- Adopt a phased implementation process, prioritising high-risk areas first
- Configure the system in line with your university’s particular structure and risk profile
- Align your use of the software with existing HSG65 and HASMAP-based safety frameworks. The latter initials stand for “Health and Safety Management Profile” – a reference to a management standard developed for higher education institutions (HEIs) by the Universities Safety and Health Association
- Ensure stakeholders undergo appropriate training and are suitably engaged
- Plan for structured data migration and integration with facility, HR, and academic systems.
Conclusion: why now is the time to strengthen university health and safety compliance
In a constantly evolving landscape of health and safety risks, and growing scrutiny from the HSE, there might have never been a more opportune moment for universities to enhance efficiency and outcomes by embracing digital systems.
Vision Pro Software is a tailored and scalable solution that has been designed and built for the higher-education sector.
Contact us today, then, and we will be pleased to introduce you to the features and functionality of Vision Pro Software that will particularly support your university’s health and safety compliance efforts.
