The law

Effective health and safety auditing provides the framework for compliance with the legal duty to monitor, maintain and review all matters and arrangements of Health & Safety.

By adhering to the Audit requirement and process, an organisation will be able to demonstrate that Heath & Safety is pro-actively managed in accordance with legislative, insurers' and Fire Department requirements.

Accepted best practice

Safety audits are widely accepted to be best practice as they enable organisations to focus resources on areas of need, prioritise actions and facilitate continuous improvement.

Audit: an official inspection of an organization's accounts, typically by an independent body.

The Health and Safety Executive define safety audits as:

“The collection of independent information on the efficiency, effectiveness and reliability of the total health and safety management system and drawing up plans for corrective action.” (from http://safety.rospa.com/safetymatters/info/safety-audits-ebook.pdf)

An alternative definition:

“An audit is a methodical, independent and documented assessment of a business’ system and processes, in which it is measured against regulated criteria to make sure health and safety standards are being upheld.” (taken from http://www.theworkplacedepot.co.uk/news/2013/10/08/importance-health-safety-audit/)

University of Sussex has stipulated audits of Schools to use The Universities Safety and Health Association (USHA) standard

For 2016 the HSE audit focuses on four criteria sections:

• Leadership
• Planning for emergencies
• Health and Safety Arrangements
• Risk assessment and risk control

The audit process recognises that there are obstacles each unit faces in developing and maintaining a comprehensive HSE management system. The audit is not intended as a crime-and-punishment exercise. Rather, its goals are to compile a capture of current state-of-play, and to provide recommendations and identify goals towards an improvement level of compliance.

SEF will continue to support local efforts, within the scope of its contract and resources.

Use this checklist to establish what documentation you already have in place, what you need to focus on next. 

Please send in as much of your HSE documentation to Margarita Steinberg, to make the auditing process swift and simple.

Download this checklist: Checklists for local documentation and implementation HSE audit 2016 in EngInf [DOCX 19.25KB]

Use this checklist to establish what you already have in place, what you need to focus on next.

Download this checklist: Checklists for local documentation and implementation HSE audit 2016 in EngInf [DOCX 19.25KB]