The Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations is the membership organisation for Scotland's charities, voluntary organisations and social enterprises. Charity registered in Scotland SC003558. Registered office Mansfield Traquair Centre, 15 Mansfield Place, Edinburgh EH3 6BB.
Health & safety
Since the Covid pandemic, we have all become more aware of how important it is to protect our communities, particularly those who are vulnerable or most at risk. We also know how important it is for people to access services safely and confidently.
There can be a lot to think about around health and safety, so we’ve broken it down into three sections:
- The general principles of a health and safety approach
- Specific areas of health and safety to be aware of
- Additional responsibilities if you’re an employer
General principles of health and safety
Health and safety law states that organisations must:
- assess risks to employees, volunteers, customers, partners and any other people who could be affected by their activities;
- arrange for the effective planning, organisation, control, monitoring and review of preventive and protective measures;
- have a written health and safety policy if they employ five or more people;
- ensure they have access to competent health and safety advice;
- consult employees and volunteers about their risks at work and current preventive and protective measures.
Some things that might help show that you have properly thought about your health and safety responsibilities include:
- A written Health and Safety Policy statement
- Risk assessment template and completed risk assessment folder
- Health and Safety Procedures for hirers/users of the community space, provided at the time of booking/on entering building
- Confirmation of persons responsible for Health and Safety and carrying out risk assessments
The Health and Safety Executive have the following useful resources:
- An overview of the Health and Safety at Work Act
- Specific guidance for village and community halls
- A checklist to help identify, address and record risks for village halls
- Guidance for managing volunteers, including incident reporting
- An introduction to managing health and safety
- A risk assessment template and examples from different organisations and accommodations
Specific health and safety areas
Asbestos is a natural fibre that was used in construction and other industries until the late 1990s which causes a range of illnesses, including cancer. It is now banned but may be present in buildings constructed before the year 2000.
If you are responsible for the maintenance and repair of your community space, the Control of Asbestos Regulations 2012 require you to:
- take reasonable steps to find out if, how much and what type of asbestos-containing materials are present
- create and keep updated an asbestos register
- prepare a risk management plan and put the plan into action.
The Health and Safety Executive has produced a guidance document on managing asbestos in buildings and you can also look at their general information on asbestos.
Legionella is a bacteria most commonly found in water. If breathed in, it can cause Legionnaires Disease and other health problems.
Under general health and safety law, where you are an employer and/or have responsibility for a premises (eg a community space), you have certain duties and need to take suitable precautions to prevent or control the risk of exposure to legionella.
The Health and Safety Executive has produced a guidance document to understand the health risks associated with legionella and details about how to manage and control risks and you can also look at their general information on legionnaires.
Under general health and safety law, where you are an employer and/or have responsibility for a premises (eg a community space), you must ensure immediate first aid help is provided if an employee, volunteer, user or visitor to your community space is taken ill or injured. You must have:
- a suitably stocked first aid kit
- an appointed person or people to take charge of first aid arrangements
- information for all persons telling them about first aid arrangements.
Health and Safety Executive has useful first aid information and guidance.
Good hygiene around food is important to prevent the spread of germs and protect your consumers. It's also important that anyone making food knows how to cook it safely to prevent illness or injury.
Whether or not you need any more formal food hygiene training or certificates will depend who you are providing food for, how often and in what context. Advice on providing food in a community space is available from the Food Standards Agency in Scotland or your local authority.
If you make or sell food for charity events and you do not need to register your community space as a food business, you should still make sure that you are aware of how to handle food safely, as detailed in this Food Standards Agency guidance on providing food at community and charity events.
You have H&S responsibilities covering the Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations 2013 (RIDDOR). This requires certain work-related accidents and incidents to be reported only when:
- there has been an accident which caused the injury
- the accident was work-related
- the injury is of a type which is reportable
To help you understand your RIDDOR responsibilities, HSE has produced a guidance document on reporting accidents and incidents at work, and more general information on RIDDOR on their website.
You have responsibilities covering the Control of Substances Hazardous to Health Regulations (COSHH). The law requires you to adequately control exposure to certain materials in your community space that can cause ill health, by:
- identifying the health hazards
- undertaking risk assessments and providing control measures
- providing information, instruction and training for community space staff, volunteers, users, visitors etc.
To help you understand your COSHH related responsibilities, the Health and Safety Executive has produced a guidance document on working with substances hazardous to health.
The British Safety Council also has an overview of the COSHH regulations and practical guidance on what it means for your community space.
Health and safety if you are an employer
This section contains information that you will need to know about if you are an employer. However they may also give you good ideas of making sure any volunteers are safe too.
As an employer, you must protect your workers from the risk of injury from hazardous manual handling in the workplace.
The Health and Safety Executive has information on manual handling at work.
Employers must take measures to reduce the risk of any of their workers falling while working at height.
The Health and Safety Executive has information on working at height.
Employers must provide PPE free of charge if a risk assessment shows it is needed.
The Health and Safety Executive has information on PPE at work.
As an employer, you must protect your workers from the health risks of working with display screen equipment (DSE), such as PCs, laptops, tablets and smartphones.
More information from the Health and Safety Executive on display screens.
- As an employer, you have the same health and safety responsibilities for people working at home (including hybrid working arrangements) as for any other worker. Things you should consider as part of your risk assessment for home workers include:
- stress and poor mental health
- using equipment like computers and laptops safely
- their working environment.
More information on homeworking is available from the Health and Safety Executive.
SCVO has a range of HR information and resources. Find out more about everything from recruitment, to employee benefits, to employee culture and engagement.