Risk Assessment

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RISK ASSESSMENT

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Healthy Workplaces was a two-year campaign that ran from 2008-2009, which aimed to promote a management approach to risk assessment.

The two-year campaign sought to convey clearly that risk assessment is a step-by-step examination of all aspects of work undertaken.


Risk assessment need not necessarily be complicated, bureaucratic or a task only for experts.

Why Risk Assessment?

Every 3.5 minutes, somebody in the EU dies from work-related causes!


167,000deaths are caused each year as a result of either work-related accidents (7,500) or occupational diseases e.g. asbestosis (159,500).

Every 4.5 seconds, a worker in the EU is involved in an accident that forces him/her to stay at home for at least 3 working days ie more than 7 million accidents a year. (Source: European Agency for Safety and Health at Work.)

These all come at huge costs:

  • Human costs
  • Business costs
  • Costs for society

A prevention approach based on risk assessment aims to put measures in place to prevent such accidents and diseases.

What is a risk assessment?

Risk assessment is the process of evaluating health and safety risks arising form hazards in the workplace.

A hazard is anything that may cause harm e.g. chemicals, electricity, machinery and equipment, an open drawer, aspects of work organisation, etc.

The risk is the chance or probability, high or low, that somebody could be harmed by these or other hazards.

A risk assessment is, therefore, a careful and systematic examination of all aspects of the work undertaken to consider what could cause injury or harm, whether the hazards could be eliminated and, if not, what preventive or protective measures are, or should be, in place to control the risks.

Employers' duties

Employers in each workplace have a moral duty and a legal responsibility to ensure the safety and health of workers. A risk assessment enables effective measures to be put in place to protect the safety and health of workers.

These include:

  • Preventing occupational risks
  • Providing information and training to workers
  • Putting in place the organisation and means to implement the necessary measures.

A risk assessment will help employers and other people responsible to:

1. Identify the hazards in the workplace and those at risk
2. Evaluate the risks associated with those hazards
3. Determine what measures should be taken to protect the safety and health of employees and others
4. Put in place the preventive and protective measures
5. Monitor and review whether the measures in place are working

What Lisburn Council did as part of the campaign

The campaign ran throughout 2008 and 2009 and featured two European Weeks of Safety and Health, in October 2008 and October 2009.

Lisburn City Council delivered a seminar to local businesses in 2009 to assist them in completing their own Risk assessments. Tim Andrew of Andrew Ingredients commented, "We found the Risk Assessment Workshop to be very beneficial to our company. We had already started our risk assessment before attending the workshop, but had some concerns and queries which we took with us. We came away with all of them answered and feeling much more confident about a task that initially seemed quite daunting. I would recommend the workshop to all businesses who are undertaking their own risk assessment, as it offers invaluable help for them to ensure not only that they comply with the law but that they are doing all they can to protect people in their place of work."

Risk assessement workshop 0ctober 2010

To build on this work the environmental health service is hosting another risk assessment workshop for small businesses on Wednesday 13 October 2010 at Lagan Valley Island starting at 9am. This will be a morning session and case studies will be tailored to the businesses attending.


Please contact us on 92509250 or e-mail to ehealth@lisburn.gov.uk for further details or to register for the workshop.

Liason with schools and colleges

Lisburn City Council also liaised with local secondary level schools and colleges to promote risk assessment by providing a quiz based lesson plan for children. This helped equip students with knowledge of risk assessment requirements, which they need to be aware of when they go on work placement or are employed as workers. For more information telephone the Environmental Health Unit on 028 9250 9304.

The Health and Safety Executive website

The Health and Safety Executive website www.hse.gov.uk/risk also has lots of information on practical steps to protect people from risks. Example risk assessments for various workplaces are also available to download at www.hse.gov.uk/risk/casestudies