Significant increase in enforcement action in Scotland

The number of Improvement and Prohibition Notices issued to Scottish organisations in the first half of this year is on course to increase by around 38 per cent compared with the corresponding period last year.

That's according to law firm Pinsent Masons whose analysis of figures published by the Health & Safety Executive show the body issued 473 “improvement” or “prohibition” notices in Scotland the first five months of 2012.

That compares to 411 in the first six months of 2011 and, on a monthly average basis, would lead to an increase of 38 per cent during the first half of this year.

The same cannot be said for English regions, and particularly London where enforcement actions have fallen sharply to 393 in the first half of 2012 from 739 in the same six months of 2011.

This projection is likely to concern manufacturing and construction businesses, which accounted for 50 and 42 per cent respectively of all enforcement actions in the UK in the first half of 2012.

Laura Cameron, a regulatory specialist at Pinsent Masons, said: “The significant increase in actions in Scotland is striking.”

The HSE is due to introduce a new charging system in the autumn under which it will be able to charge to recover the costs of investigations and enforcement measures where an offence has occurred.

David Ashton, the HSE's director of field operations, responded to the claims that it is targeting businesses in Scotland more than those elsewhere, stressing that the HSE “operates a consistent Britain-wide enforcement approach that is in line with the policy published on our website.

“Comparing enforcement year on year is misleading, as is making a direct comparison with other parts of Britain,” he said.

“While we have broad regulatory priorities that are pertinent to the whole of Britain, there are also initiatives relevant to some areas which can lead to different activity patterns at different times, such as the refurbishment initiative in the construction sector we ran in the early part of this year.”

Ashton added: “The key point here is that enforcement notices are issued in response to serious health and safety shortcomings. The real issue of concern should be the poor standards that have led to the notices being served in the first place.”