SAFETY, HEALTH & WELFARE STATEMENT

Another job for the school leader?

ANGELA LYNCH IPPN LEADERSHIP SUPPORT TEAM

Who is responsible for the workload relating to health, safety and welfare in the school? The Board of Management (BoM) is legally responsible – Circular 18/2018 reminds Boards of the need to remain vigilant in the management of health, safety and welfare. However, everybody in the school has a role to play in ensuring good safety and welfare within the school. All staff are required to co-operate fully with the employer, so that appropriate health, safety and welfare policies are established and implemented. All employees are expected to adhere to these policies.

to put measures in place to mitigate the risks and put in place systems that are then communicated to staff and the wider school community where appropriate. For example, information may be displayed within the staffroom, school entrance and website. Common sense and leadership are required in this regard.

School leaders will identify other risks outside of the above.

In some schools, 15 minutes per term at the end of a staff meeting or Croke Park Hour is set aside to review and update the list of risks. These are then collated by the principal and presented to the BoM for discussion. Once the mitigations have been agreed, they are added to the Health Safety and Welfare Statement. A member of the Board could be assigned to assist the principal in collating and presenting the staff survey to the Board. It is important to complete this task once a term to identify any new risks and assess the measures previously taken.

The focus of health and safety statements is usually on risks involving buildings and plant, initially. However, the same attention may not be given to areas such as workplace bullying, the effects of stress on mental health, and aggressive, threatening behaviour towards a pupil, staff member or another member of the school community. Stress can result in increasing absences, conflicts and anger levels as well as isolation, possibly leading to high blood pressure, headaches and other physical symptoms.

While the Board cannot be held responsible for righting all ills within the school, it is the Board’s responsibility, once being made aware of these risks,

As each staff member is responsible for co-operation with the Board for the establishment of health, safety and welfare policies, it makes sense that everyone within the school should take responsibility for identifying risks within their own area of influence. In this way:

Teachers identify risks within their own classrooms, such as possible flight risks, tripping hazards, electrical equipment, potential areas of conflict

Caretakers identify hazardous materials and storage of same, boiler safety, outdoor hazards, severe weather issues, fire alarms and equipment

Secretaries identify safety risks in the office and reception areas, such as school access, tripping hazards, telephone management, financial concerns

It can often be difficult to manage the risks involved with welfare issues. To this end, schools should consider enhancing their safety, health and welfare framework by developing a Dignity and Respect in the Workplace (DRaW) Charter and Policy, if they have not already done so. A DRaW Resource Bundle is available in the Resources section of the IPPN website to assist with the process.

IPPN is currently developing additional resources in this area. The Health and Safety Authority (HSA) has developed Risk Assessment Templates for Primary schools to supplement their Guidelines on Managing Health Safety and Welfare in Primary Schools Parts 1 and 2. The templates are now available in Word or PDF format and each template can be downloaded individually – prior to now they were all in one PDF document. They are available at the HSA website, www.hsa.ie.