Occupational health and safety insurance

The Construction Regulations, effective from February 2014, under the Occupational Health and Safety Act (No 85 of 1993/Act) state that:

If a worker is injured on site the owner, property manager and the contractor could be held individually or jointly criminally and/ or civilly liable for failure to comply with the legislation.

If you are already undertaking, or are going to undertake, maintenance, alterations, extensions, building or demolition work on one of your buildings, the Construction Regulations (2014) will apply to you. The intention of this legislation is to help reduce accidents, injuries and ill health affecting maintenance and construction workers on site – an objective we all support.

The Construction Regulations (2014) apply to all commercial, multi-storey residential and sectional title unit property owners. All property owners (except owners of domestic dwellings in which they reside or intend to reside) are now specifically bound by this legislation.

Relevant property owners must meet basic health and safety duties and responsibilities. The regulations specify that property owners must appoint only qualified and competent contractors to perform the work safely and must provide anyone working on the premises with, among other things:

• Instructions and adequate resources for the work to be done safely.
• Identification of any hazards on the property – and the reduction of risks attached to those hazards.
• A health and safety file – this is a record of information that focuses on the management of health and safety for contractors and sub-contractors on work sites.

The Department of Labour is determined to make sure that maintenance and construction workers are better protected on construction sites, and intends to enforce the Act and legislation vigorously. Even if compliant, all parties can still be taken to court in the event of a death or injury on site – and owners and managers need protection from this.

Your current insurance may not cover these onerous risks brought about by the amendments to the Occupational Health and Safety Act.

If you need any assistance in relation to this important cover, feel free to contact Paddy Herbert, our specialist in this field:

021 7027960 or 082 445 7112
paddy@phoenixrisk.co.za

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Legal opinion provided by Klass Looch Associates

MEDIA AND RELATED ARTICLES

SA Property Review – OHSI safety first article

OHSI CONSULTANTS:

For building health and safety inspections and reports, building baseline risk assessments and building health and safety files, please contact the Association of Construction Health and Safety Management.