Keeping Control in a Crisis ; It Is Every Employer's Nightmare: A Work-Related Accident Resulting in Serious Injury or, Even Worse, a Fatality. Tim Hill, Regulatory Expert at Eversheds Law Firm in Newcastle, Looks at How Businesses Can Plan for and Respond to a Crisis.

Summary

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QUITE apart from the human tragedy, the next thought in today's legal climate is more than likely the fear that the employer themselves, both as a company and as individual directors or managers, could end up facing criminal charges as a result of not doing everything that was 'reasonably practicable' to prevent the accident occurring. This is a very high hurdle to overcome.

How an organisation responds to such a crisis, particularly in the first 72 hours, is crucial. Not only does the interaction with the regulatory authorities often set the tone for the ensuing investigation which could last many months or even years, but also, in our experience, the speed and quality of an organisation's response in such a high pressure situation tends to be indicative of that organisation as a business.

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Extract

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Keeping Control in a Crisis ; It Is Every Employer's Nightmare: A Work-Related Accident Resulting in Serious Injury or, Even Worse, a Fatality. Tim Hill, Regulatory Expert at Eversheds Law Firm in Newcastle, Looks at How Businesses Can Plan for and Respond to a Crisis.

Make no mistake: good management of health and safety is good business, and those organisations who make it a top priority, more often than not, are top performin...

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