A government minister has urged small businesses to improve health and safety procedures to boost their productivity.
Jane Kennedy, the minister for work, said that risk management was the key to reducing the amount of deaths and injuries in the workplace.
In a speech to the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents, Kennedy said that although health and safety records in businesses had improved in recent years, more needed to be done.
The issue of health and safety has become a major concern for small firms, with the number of compensation claims made by injured employees rising sharply over the past five years.
Worryingly, research has found that nearly a quarter of UK firms do not have employers’ liability insurance, which is required by law and helps protect bosses against legal cases relating to health and safety.
Kennedy said that proper risk management can improve health and safety procedures and boost businesses’ productivity.
“Effective management of health and safety can help deliver improved productivity and efficiency.
“Risk management is the key that unlocks progress while bearing down on resultant suffering and loss of life. We must champion the case for sensible controls, sensibly applied.
“The rate of fatal injuries has fallen by over two thirds in the last thirty years, but we are now seeing a plateau in performance,” she said.
