Click on "Your Health & Safety Duties" below to see the kind of obligations that fall on you. Click on "Penalties" to see the sentences that can be handed down where someone is convicted of a Health & Safety offence.
Prosecution can lead to very high fines - without limit - and even substantial periods of imprisonment for particular individuals. In the worst cases, where there is a death, imprisonment may be for life.
It is essential to get good professional advice about complying with the requirements of health & safety law from the start, to avoid things going wrong and to avoid finding yourself in circumstances where you may be prosecuted.
Our large Regulatory and Defence team can advise on Health & Safety law long before anything goes wrong - don't wait until you have a disaster before checking whether what you are doing is right.
If you are unlucky enough to find yourself investigated or prosecuted you must take legal advice at the earliest possible opportunity.
Types of Health & Safety Offences - and who can be prosecuted?
Criminal offences can be committed by breach of the health & safety laws in two ways :
- Employers or individuals can fail to comply with their main duties e.g. by failing to ensure, so far as is reasonably practicable, the health and safety of employees.
- They can also fail to comply with specific requirements under the multitude of regulations that come within the main laws - e.g. failure to obey the regulations dealing with the safety of people working in confined spaces.
Where companies are prosecuted, company directors, managers or other officers may also be prosecuted and punished personally if it is alleged that an offence "has been committed with the consent or connivance of, or to have been attributable to any neglect on the part of, the person concerned”.
How we can help.
As well as helping you to make sure you are fully compliant with all laws long before anything goes wrong, we can advise and assist you during any investigation that takes place.
We can tell you about the powers of the investigating officers - you can see something of those powers by clicking on "Investigators' Powers" below.
We can arrange to be with you to advise you during the investigations of the officers and in particular we can be present at interviews under caution and can advise you before during and after such interviews on the best manner of proceeding.
We can make representations to a police custody officer in the event of an individual being arrested and prosecuted for manslaughter if the possibility of that individual being kept in custody until the trial arises.
In such cases we can make an application to a court for bail pending trial.
We can take detailed instructions from you on the events giving rise to the investigation/prosecution and:
- Make representations on your behalf to the prosecuting authority before a decision has been made on whether or not to charge you, urging that there be no prosecution or that if there is to be a prosecution it should be for less serious rather than more serious offences.
- If you are prosecuted, arrange for you to be represented in court by one of our highly experienced specialist lawyers or by a specialist barrister.
- Advise you on how you should plead to any charge you may face, i.e. guilty or not guilty.
- Advise you on whether it is to your advantage, where you have a choice, to be tried by the Magistrates' Court or the Crown Court.
- Where you decide to plead guilty, gather all the necessary evidence so that the best mitigation can be put to the court to minimise the severity of the sentence.
- Where you decide to plead not guilty, gather all the necessary evidence, interview witnesses, instruct expert witnesses etc, so that your chances of achieving a not guilty verdict are maximised.
- Generally guide and support you through the court proceedings.
As we say, we are always there for people and families who are in our PURPLE LEGAL scheme. We invite you to join PURPLE LEGAL now. By joining PURPLE LEGAL, you can have all your legal enquiries answered free of charge by simply booking a SolicitorSlot for a time and date that suits you. Alternatively if you wish to speak to us now, please click on "Please Contact Me Now” or call us on 0845 567 5000. We look forward to always being there for you.
