Health and Safety

Health & Safety at Work Act - What does it mean for me?

Everyone, whether employer or employee, has responsibilities under this law to keep themselves and others around them safe and healthy.

Here are some of the responsibilities everyone has:

• You need to take reasonable steps to keep yourself safe and healthy.
• You need to take reasonable steps not to put other people at risk by what you do, or don't, do.
• You need to report anything unsafe (likely to cause harm) if you cannot do anything about it yourself.

Breaking the Health and Safety at Work Act can lead to fines and sometimes prison sentences, so it is important to make sure you know what your responsibilities are.

Please read the additional Health & Safety at Work Act information for further details and links to other resources.

Safeguarding

What does it mean?

• Protecting children from maltreatment
• Preventing impairment of children's health or development
• Ensuring that children grow up in circumstances consistent with the provision of safe and effective care
  
• Enabling those children to have optimum life chances and enter adulthood successfully

Safeguarding is everyone's responsibility. Everyone who works with children should be able to recognise and know how to act upon the indicators that a child's welfare and safety may be at risk.

Please read the Safeguarding: what does it mean? for further information.

Equality and Diversity

What is the new Equality Act?

The new Equality Act was implemented this October 2010. There aren't endless changes to previous legislation, but there are some significant ones, which you need to be aware of. The point of this Act is to streamline and combine previous legislation and these measures are obviously there to help protect minority groups and those who are discriminated against. 

The headings of age, disability (which includes mental health and people diagnosed as clinically obese), race, religion or belief, sex, sexual orientation, gender reassignment (people who are having or who have had a sex change, transvestites and transgender people), marriage and civil partnership, and pregnancy and maternity are now to be known as 'protected characteristics'. 

Please read the additional equality act information to find out about the seven different types of discrimination. For a snapshot, view ACAS' Equality Act 2010 Table.