Does anybody know about health and safety at work? Currently my OH (who works outside) is doing a health and safety review but they are stuck on sun creams/protection. Who's responsiblity is it to provide sun cream/protoection to workers who are outside all day in the sun??? Is it the individual worker or the employer?
Any ideas?
GG

initially when i asked my husband who holds an iosh managing safely qualification said 'the individual' but then thought about it and said it could be classed as p.p.e so would therefore be the employers!  although not a definate answer so not much help maybe!

My employer advises us to wear suncream as a part of a risk assessment to working oudoors - and they also provide some factor 30 too.  (though it is the cheap stuff so personally i use my own!)

Thanks Craigles and Sharon, I'll inform OH. It would be good for his work to provide the sunscreen as then the "big tough" boys that work there might not think that it is such a girly thing to do
GG

When I worked in a Uni health and safety office, I had to order and supply suncream to the groundsmen who were out in summer cutting the grass etc.

I would say there is probably nothing written down that would say that OH's company need to provide sunscreen to its employees.  However a properly conducted risk assessment would identify that there is a risk of skin cancer to those employees working outside all day long.  And following such a risk assessment, an employer would realise that therefore sunscreen is necessary.

H&S Law gets complicated nowadays by the fact that it puts a lot of onus on the employee as well as the employer.  However I don't think in this circumstance that it would put the onus to buy sunscreen on the employee - but rather to bring the matter to the attention of his employers and request that they provide him the sunscreen.

As someone who specialises in this field.

All tasks need to be risk assessed taking into account various hazards, one of them would be radiation, whether ionised or non ionised, another would be temperature.

If a task is performed outside then the correct PPE needs to be provided by the employer whatever that may entail ie high viz, waterproof clothing and suncream where appropriate.  It is the employer's duty to provide PPE or if not to fund it.

If there is a real risk of harm through sun damage (cancer etc) via the tasks/activities by the employee then suncream could be seen as a form of PPE (personal protective equipment) and therefore the duty of care would be on the employER

I will have to tell my boss this after getting burnt yesterday!!!!!
Lea :)

PS this should be identified through the risk assessment .....

The bosses reaction.
Will buy me a shirt to cover up completely
30 degrees out in the middle of summer and I will have to wear all long sleeved and trousers!!!1
I dont think so.!!!
Lea :)

Lea
what do you do?
You could argue that the long shirt may cause heat exhaustion and therefore is an additional risk in itself

I am a landscape gardener!!!!!
So yeah, long sleeved tops and trousers would cause heat exhaustion!!!!!
Lea :)

Actually ..in most very hot countries, locals tend to wear very loose long sleeves and long skirts or loose trousers ;)

I think that the problem with this is that as OH works on a golfcourse they have to wear overalls so he does not tend to get burnt on his arms but the back of his neck and ears every year is ridiculously burnt. His face mostly fine as they have silly hard hats that look like baseball caps but larger :-D :-D
GG