About Competent Person
The law requires all employers to appoint a competent person in health and safety, and this should preferably be an internal appointment. More specifically it is a requirement of the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations. Regulation 7 requires employers to appoint one or more Competent Person(s) to assist them in meeting their legal obligations.The Regulations also require sufficient resources to be devoted to managing H&S.
The Regulation, the Approved Code of Practice and Guidance on the subject do not prescribe any level of training, qualification or experience as necessary to fulfil this role. As a consequence interpretation of the term varies widely between, and even within organisations. In seems that competence is a confusing and ambiguous concept to most employers.
The Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999 state that a person is competent “where he has sufficient training and experience or knowledge and other qualities to enable him properly” to do the task in question.However, there is no comprehensive and prescriptive definition of what is required. Whilst knowledge can be assessed through formal examinations, skills and experience present a greater problem.
Therefore organisations often find it difficult to appoint persons to adequately fulfil this role.
Results you should expect
All organisations whether large or small need to ensure that they have access to competent health and safety support to assist them in meeting their legal obligations. In larger organisations this is often an internal appointment of one or more persons but for smaller organisations this is ofen not financially possible. But whatever the size of your organisation you need to ask yourself do we have access to persons that will both keep our people safe and ensure that we keep on the right side of health and safety legislation?
You need to be confident that the persons you are employing have the necessary qualifications, experience and personal qualities to fulfill the role of Competent Persons to your organisation. At MESH we provide our clients with expert advice and support based upon their own individual needs. Not only do we only employ highly qualified and experinced consultants but we also take the time to find out about your business and business needs before taking on the role of Competent Persons with a client.
Working with MESH you can be fully assured that we will assist you to achieve legislative health and safety compliance. We often find the best way of achieving this is to undertake an initial health & safety compliance review to determine what level of support is needed. From this we are able to provide a health and safety action plan tailored to your organisational needs.
MESH Consultants have used our extensive experience health and safety experience and knowledge to ensure peace of mind for clients in a wide range of industries throughout the UK.
Featured Case Study
Client: Emerson Willis
Sector: Construction
Emerson Willis Ltd has been delighted with the service provided by MESH Consultants.
Martin and his team have given excellent training and guidance to our staff over the last year.
It is good to know that we have competent HSE advisors on call at the end of the phone.
David Norton – Director
Emerson Willis Ltd
MESH was employed by Emerson Willis Ltd who manage construction projects mainly for local authorities to assist the company to renew its CHAS and Construction Line applications. MESH started working with the company in March 2009 and has taken on the role of competent persons which has involved:
- Auditing the existing health & safety systems Updating health & safety policies & risk assessments
- Completion of the CHAS application
- Delivery of IOSH Managing Safely training to the directors, management and site supervisors.
- The works completed have enabled to company to confidently move forwards knowing that it is fully health & safety compliant.
MESH continues to assist the company with ongoing advice and answering of health, safety & environmental questions that arise. We are also contracted to carryout twice yearly audits of the health, safety & environmental performance both of the company as a whole and individual construction projects through ad hoc inspections.
Your Options
MESH can offer a range of Competent Person options to organisations throughout the UK, we do however insist that we need to understand your business and your business needs in relation to health and safety:
1. We can undertake an audit of your organisations health and safety compliance and provide you with an action plan and consultancy support plan to implement any necessary improvements.
2. We can supply your organisation with a consultant to lead health and safety within your organisation.
3. We can support your in-house health and safety persons by undertaking scheduled routine compliance checking visits (which could be monthly to as little as 6 monthly).
What we provide is a service that can be tailored to you to enable you to meet legislative health and safety compliance, and keep the HSE inspector satisfied that you have Competent Persons advising you.
Costs
Costs of Competent Persons support can vary depending on the type and size of organisations and the range of activities we are requested to carryout for an organisation. We work with large, medium and small size businesses and will often provide a range of options for the organisation to select from.
As a guideline, we have provided organisations with as little as three days support over a 12 month period up to examples where we have provided clients with a person on site for 2-3 days per week over the same period. Because of this our fees have ranged from the hundreds to tens of thousands to provide support that meets the individual organisations needs.
We believe our pricing is very competitive but we don't compromise on quality and you can be assured that our consultants will add valve to your business. We would expect you to shop around for quotations but would encourage you to check what level of service is being provided. Ask yourself whether you getting health and safety support that will make a long-term difference to the health and safety of your staff and your business. If in any doubt, please do contact us without obligation.
Where we work
MESH provides Competent Person services for companies in a diverse range of industries throughout the UK.
Our Head Office is in Kent, with regional offices located in London, The Home Counties, The Midlands, and The North East.
