Introduction
Health
and safety regulations require employers to assess the risks of health and safety
of our young employees.
The Health and Safety (Young Persons) Regulations 1997,
were introduced to
comply with the European Young Persons Directive.
The regulations require
employers to give specific consideration to the health and safety of young people
at work.
Definition
of a Young Person.
The
term "young person" refers to employees under eighteen (18) years of
age.
The aim of these regulations is to promote the health, safety and welfare
of young employees
and to help prevent accidents at work.
Employers
are required to:
- Make
a risk assessment before the young person begins work and address specific factors
such as the type of equipment the individual will be expected to operate.
- Extreme
caution must be exercised with equipment that young people are prohibited from
operating, such as band saws and bowl choppers etc. Further advise relating to
prohibited machinery and young persons is available on request from Greencore
Group SHE department.
- Take
particular account of a young workers lack of experience, their absence of awareness
of existing or potential risks, and/or their immaturity when assessing risks to
health and safety
- Take
account of the risk assessment in determining whether the young person is prohibited
from doing work. (However, this requirement will not apply to young people over
the school leaving-age, where the work is necessary for their training, so long
as they are properly supervised and risks are reduced to the lowest practical
level)
- You
must Inform parents or those with parental responsibility for school age children
by letter, of the outcome of the risk assessment and the control measures introduced.
Risk
assessment is not a new concept in health and safety.
