Ms Patricia King:

That is the nub of the entire piece. The infrastructure would mean that the representative on the ground would be the eyes and ears in a workplace. The workers should feel confident about being able to liaise with that person and say something is not happening or is not happening correctly or often enough, such as cleaning, hygiene or whatever. Under this protocol, that representative is supposed to be able to liaise with the management representative during the course of the day and have a conversation about what needs to happen. If something does not happen, the representative has a number of options. If he or she is in a trade union, he or she can go to a trade union official. As the Deputy knows, larger companies have health and safety representatives. Smaller companies do not usually have them.