Daily View: Health and Safety
David Cameron's proposed shake-up of the health and safety laws has got commentators discussing the merits and culture around the current laws.
On researching the story about children wearing goggles to play conkers, Zoe Williams in the Guardian found that many health and safety stories have become myths, debunked on the Health and Safety executive's website. That got her wondering about David Cameron's motivations:
"It's almost as if Cameron is playing an elaborate double game, in which he makes a dim-witted, saloon-bar argument to one chunk of constituents, while giving a knowing, conspiratorial wink to his savvier supporters who know how to use a computer."
Melanie Reid in the Times argues that it's the culture, not laws that are the problem:
"The prevailing safety culture closely resembles state censorship. It works most powerfully not in its actual application but in people's anticipation of its application, which is much, much worse. Its sin is not to be deliberately obstructive; it is to encourage large numbers of people to disempower others needlessly in a myriad small ways.
The Telegraph editorial welcomes David Cameron's proposals as it sees the current situation as "insanity":
"Everyone knows that something has gone fundamentally wrong with the way health and safety laws are applied. They were introduced for very good reason: to reduce deaths and injuries on building sites and at other potentially dangerous places of work. However, a general duty placed upon employers in the 1974 Health and Safety at Work Act has developed into a monster that devours common sense, discretion and personal responsibility."
Nick Sommerlad in the Mirror says David Cameron's "elf'n'safety gawn mad" policies are driven by ideology, not facts:
"Britain's health and safety culture is one of our success stories, bringing workplace deaths down to a record low and making us one of the safest places in Europe to work"
Among the Labour bloggers, Labour MP Kerry McCarthy in her blog Shot by Both Sides says Cameron doesn't do his homework. She points out that the health and safety executive have said there is no ban on playing conkers and that a lot of the stories such as a library refusing to give out scissors are from Tory run councils. Meanwhile Alastair Campbell takes a pop at Cameron's priorities:
"So on a day when he could have contributed to the debate on Afghanistan, on the global economy, on the national economy pre-PBR, he comes out with a lot of vacuous nonsense cobbled together with a few Daily Mail cuttings, whose accuracy given the source cannot be taken for granted."
Links in full
• Zoe Williams | Guardian | Conkers, goggles, elf'n'safety? You really could make it up
• Melanie Reid | Times | Health & safety can damage your reasoning
• Telegraph | From safety to sanity
• Kerry McCarthy |Shot by Both Sides | Cameron doesn't do his homework
• Alastair Campbell | Cameron's conkers add to his problem with serious opinion
• Nick Sommerlad | Mirror | Cameron's bad for your 'elf
• Phillip Johnston | Telegraph | Would a Good Samaritan law end health and safety madness?
• Jeff Taylor | The Economic Voice | Cameron attacks the over zealous health and safety culture
