Britain: An official handbook > 1977

EMPLOYMENT
347
Training and
Research in
Safety
Health and
Welfare
Employment of
Women and
Children
Training is important in accident prevention and the Training Services Agency
provides a course in job safety for supervisors in its TWI scheme (see p. 334).
The industrial training boards usually include specific provisions for safety
training in their training recommendations.
RoSPA provides a variety of safety courses for special needs, mainly at its
Industrial Safety Training Centre in Birmingham, and also helps the accident
prevention movement by providing publicity and organising conferences; its
regional industrial safety officers work to promote safety activity among top-
level managers. The British Safety Council also offers safety training courses.
Other courses are organised by local accident prevention groups and organisa¬
tions such as the Federation of Civil Engineering Contractors.
A substantial amount of research is being done by industry, universities and
other academic bodies, and government research organisations into problems of
guarding machines, ergonomics, safe handling, electrical hazards, nuclear
safety, protective personal equipment, construction methods, fires and ex¬
plosions, psychological factors and causes of accidents, both generally and in
particular sectors of industry. A register of research into industrial health and
safety matters has been compiled by the Department of Employment to give
an indication of the scale and nature of research being undertaken. Industrial
research associations include among their more purely economic research pro¬
jects the improvement of working conditions and the reduction of hazards.
The National Coal Board conducts courses of safety training for workmen
and officials. Its research programme includes a number of projects with a direct
bearing on safety. In addition, the Health and Safety Executive has a statutory
responsibility for research concerning the safety and health of coal miners,
largely exercised through its Safety in Mines Research Establishment.
The University of Aston in Birmingham helps to meet the need for academic¬
ally trained safety officers and engineers whose careers will be concerned with
the technical aspects of insurance and forensic work.
Great importance is attached to preventing health hazards at work and previous
legislation relating to factories, mines and quarries and offices has been strength¬
ened and reinforced by the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act. General
requirements within the Act relate to the manufacture, safe handling and
storage of substances which present a health risk, the maintenance of a healthy
environment, and the provision of adequate arrangements for welfare at work.
More detailed requirements are also prescribed (for example, in the Factories
Act) and relate to matters such as heating, lighting, ventilation, general clean¬
liness, dust and fume control, sanitary accommodation, washing facilities and
first aid. Specific regulations also make detailed requirements for certain
processes associated with health risks (for example, dust in foundries and
mines, and lead processes). Many industrial firms and organisations, as well as
the Health and Safety Executive, supported by extensive laboratory facilities
monitor health hazards to which their employees may be exposed.
Legislation, besides forbidding employment of children under 13 years of age,
forbids the employment of children who have not reached the statutory mini¬
mum school-leaving age (now 16) in any industrial undertaking; of young
people underground in mines and in certain other dangerous occupations (for
example, certain processes connected with lead manufacture); and of women in
factories and workshops within four weeks after childbirth (see also pp. 123 and
345). It also limits and defines the permissible hours of employment for young
people (see p. 337). Local authorities, moreover, have wide powers under the