Health and safety at work

Where can I view details of health and safety notices served by the council?

The council holds a public register of improvement and prohibition notices served under the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974. Information will not be published for notices that impose requirements or prohibitions solely for the protection of persons at work.

The public register also holds information of prohibition notices served under the Safety of Sports Grounds Act 1975.

To obtain a copy of the register please email the Food, Safety and Licensing team using the contact details at the bottom of this page.

How long do notices remain on the register?

Notices will appear on this register for a period of three years.

Information on notices will not be published where the issue of the notice can still be appealed, is under appeal or the notice has been cancelled. To account for any delays in been notified by the tribunal or court of an appeal application, we will wait for a period of five weeks to elapse before publishing on the register.

What notice types appear on the register?

Health and Safety at Work Act 1974

The council normally enforces health and safety standards by giving advice on how to comply with the law. Sometimes we must order people to make improvements by issuing them with a notice. This will either be an improvement notice which allows time for the recipient to comply or a prohibition notice which prohibits an activity until remedial action has been taken.

We issue notices to companies and individuals for breaches of health and safety law. The notice may involve one or more instances when the recipient has failed to comply with health and safety law - each one of these is called a 'breach'.

Safety of Sports Grounds Act 1975

Under sports ground safety law, the Local Authority may issue a prohibition notice in respect of all or part of any sports ground if it considers that the admission of spectators involves a risk to them so serious that, until steps have been taken to reduce it to a reasonable level admission of spectators ought to be prohibited or restricted. The prohibition may be general or may apply to a particular event.

A prohibition notice is a measure of last resort. It may be general or apply to a particular event. In practice, it is likely to be required only if the problem is urgent or the certificate holder or management of the sports ground appears unable or unwilling to rectify the situation before the next event.

If the local authority considers and states in the notice that the risk to spectators is or may be imminent, the notice takes effect as soon as it is served. In all other cases, it comes into force at the end of the period specified in the notice. The local authority may amend or withdraw the notice at any time.

Prosecution

If necessary, we may prosecute recipients for non-compliance with a notice. There are also circumstances when no further action will be taken against non-compliance.

We follow our enforcement policy to decide on the most appropriate action to take.