Health and Safety: Providing Protective Gear

Health and Safety: Providing Protective Gear

If you provide personal protective equipment (PPE) to your workers, here’s how to stay compliant when new laws take effect in April 2016.

Before providing PPE, you should first consider if there are better ways of dealing with the risk. Can the risk be eliminated – done away with altogether? If not, how can you control the risk, so far as is reasonably practical? Discuss any risks and steps to reduce them with your workers so everyone knows what to do.

In some workplaces, PPE will be the last line of defence – because you haven’t been able to eliminate the risk.

If PPE is needed, your business is responsible for supplying appropriate PPE. You can do this in two ways – by buying the PPE yourself, or through allowances added to your workers’ pay.

The cost of PPE must be covered by the business. Workers must take responsibility for wearing and using it properly. Some workers may wish to provide their own for genuine reasons of comfort and convenience – for example safety glasses with prescription lenses – but it remains your business’s responsibility to make sure it’s of an appropriate type and condition. It’s also your business’s duty to make sure PPE is well maintained, stored close at hand and correctly used when required.

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