17 January 2006 - Is Health and Safety too costly for Small Businesses

17 January 2006 - Is Health and Safety too costly for Small Businesses:

As part of the Health and Safety Executive's (HSE's) 'Better Business Campaign', the HSE commissioned Continental Research to conduct the UK Small Business New Year Resolution Opinion Survey 2005 designed to 'investigate awareness and opinion relating to workplace incidents.'

The survey showed that although small businesses planned to make improvements to health and safety within their workplaces, the cost of doing so made it a lower priority than other factors such as the following:

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Most important areas of development for small businesses were shown as having better financial systems and more effective marketing.
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Staff training was seen as the next priority.
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Enhancing I.T. systems was deemed to be of priority also.
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Health and Safety is pushed to the bottom of the priorities list.

The survey found that although 57% of small businesses made good intention resolutions, 21% would be broken within 2 weeks and 43% within 4 weeks, due to so many other areas having to be focused on.

Injuries and work-related illness within the UK in 2005 were as high as 600,000, at a staggering cost to companies of £1,200 per person, which for small businesses causes serious profit losses.

Judith Donovan CBE, Health and Safety Commissioner for Small Businesses said:

'It's easy to overlook or neglect health and safety measures, but in fact preventative measures can benefit businesses financially by averting work based incidents, and the associated staff and workplace costs that follow.'

'Whereas many businesses fail to make the most of their new systems or practices, health and safety measures are always in the interest of the firm, as they will contribute to protecting the staff, productivity and ultimately the bottom line.'

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