Appointing a Health and Safety Competent Person

What is competence?

HSE state that “Competence can be described as the combination of training, skills, experience and knowledge that a person has and their ability to apply them to perform a task safely. Other factors, such as attitude and physical ability, can also affect someone’s competence.”

What should a Health and safety competent person do?

Your appointed competent person must have the skills, knowledge and experience to ensure that controls are put in place to protect people from harm.  This means they must be able to recognise hazards in your business.  When putting controls in place they must protect workers and others from harm.  This could be guests and visitors to your site or the general public passing by.

Do they need training and qualifications?

The HSE say it can help but it isn’t required by law for your competent person to have been formally trained and hold qualifications.  However, in our experience, the people that are usually deemed competent do in fact hold qualifications and have been trained.  Having someone who has undertaken training and holds relevant qualifications helps to reassure and back up their competence.

Who can be appointed as your Health and safety competent person?

As an employer it is possible to appoint one or more of the following as your competent person:

• A consultant
• A worker(s)
• Yourself

Remember that whoever you choose must be able to prove competency.

How do you choose a Health and Safety competent person?

Like many businesses, a lot do not have the competence in-house or do not want to undertake this task themselves.  You see a lot of employers don’t have the right skillset themselves or do not have the time because running a business itself is a mammoth task let alone dealing with all the intricacies of health and safety.

This is where sourcing the right help can be a weight lifted off your shoulders.  But like anything it must be undertaken as a buyer beware exercise.  There are lots of health and safety advisors and consultants in the marketplace, but you need to ensure you find the right one for you.

As an employer, managing health and safety is still your legal duty, so you need to find a company that understands you and your company.

Our team of consultants all have different disciplines so we will have the right fit for you and be able to meet your needs. We can prove competence and be able to help you meet the Government’s stringent laws.

If you want to chat through this or any service more then book a call today with one of our health and safety consultants.

Book your FREE health and safety review surgery with our Health and Safety expert John Crockett IMaPS, SIIRSM RSP, ACIOB.

This is a free 30-minute video call where you get the opportunity to discuss and diagnose any current health and safety compliance issues.

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