Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees
Wednesday, 1 May 2024
Joint Oireachtas Committee on Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation
Role and Operation of the Health and Safety Authority: Discussion
9:30 am
Mr. Conor O'Brien:
Yes. I know from my own experience working in the private sector, going back to the 1980s when the 1989 Act came in, a sea change occurred. I mean people started to take health and safety seriously from that point on and it started to become part of the culture of organisations. In a lot of the organisations I worked in at that time I could see that happening. The real sea change from my perspective was the 2005 Act and the duty of responsibilities for senior people in organisations. That brought health and safety up to a completely new level in terms of how seriously health and safety was taken. Then we started to see more and more work in terms of health and safety committees, the appointment of health and safety officers and, indeed, more recently, health and safety representatives who are employee representatives regarding health and safety. The cultural change has been on an exponential scale. Luckily, the fatality rates have reduced in line with that. There has been a serious change in culture.