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References to and/or interpretations of Health and Safety Regulations - Binns - v - Speechly Bircham

Health and Safety (Display Screen Equipment) Regulations 1992
	Contextual Commentary | Binns - v - Speechly Bircham | Find Other Cases

In the Judgment on the 3rd July 1997, at G on page 5, HH Judge Rich states:

It does not, however, follow from the fact that the Plaintiff suffered her injury as a result of her employment that the Defendants are liable in negligence, or that they are liable because of any breach in the regulations which have governed the health and safety of users of VDU equipment since the beginning of 1993. Those regulations are the Health & Safety Display Screen Equipment Regulations 1992. They have been made in conformity with a directive of the European Commission made on 29 May, 1990. It is submitted by [Counsel for the Claimant] that having regard to their derivation they ought to be construed in a specific way. Certainly, it must be my duty to construe them so that they do have meaning and effect in serving the purpose which they are clearly directed to - namely, safeguarding the health and safety at work of those who use VDUs. Nevertheless, regulations of this kind impose upon employers obligations (and I suspect maybe even criminal sanctions if they are not complied with). It seems to me that the Court must take some care to derive their effect from their actual language rather than adopting an approach which might be in danger of construing them merely on the basis that it must have been the intention of the regulation that the employer should be required to do everything which would prevent that outcome which I have actually found already did follow from the employment of this particular Plaintiff.

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Health and Safety (Display Screen Equipment) Regulations 1992
Regulation 4	Contextual Commentary | Binns - v - Speechly Bircham | Find Other Cases

In the Judgment on the 3rd July 1997, at G on page 6, HH Judge Rich states:

[Counsel for the Plaintiff] relies firstly on Regulation 4. That requires that:

"Every employer shall so plan the activities of users at work in his undertaking that their daily work on display screen equipment is periodically interrupted by such breaks, or changes of activity, as reduce their workload at that equipment".

He invites me to construe that regulation as obliging the employer to devise an arrangement which ensures that the employee takes a sufficient number of breaks and/or sufficiently long breaks so as to reduce the employee's workload at the equipment as compared with what it would be if the plan was not devised. I cannot think that that is the requirement of this regulation. The regulation is to apply to all those who engage in work using display screen equipment as a significant part of their normal work. If such significant use places the employee in no danger of injury to health or safety, it cannot be a proper construction of Regulation 4 that nonetheless the employer is obliged to reduce the workload.

I think that the regulation means no more than a plan must be produced such that the work at the equipment is periodically interrupted either by such breaks, or by such changes of activity as reduce the employees workload at the equipment. I think that that understanding is in conformity with the guidance which was issued by the Health and Safety Executive in advance of the regulations which is, of course, of no force at all in the construction of the regulation, but is of considerable assistance in explaining the context of the circumstances of employment with which the regulation is concerned to deal. That guidance notes that in most tasks natural breaks or pauses occur as a consequence of an inherent organisation of the work. Therefore, whenever possible, jobs at the display screen should be designed to consist of a mix of screen based and non-screen based work to prevent fatigue and to vary visual and mental demands.

The guidance goes on to deal with the circumstances where it is inevitable that the work should contain intensive displays of screen work which are not interrupted. The ordinary course of the Plaintiff's work, in spite of the fact that the majority of her time was in front of the VDU, did not involve uninterrupted periods of work exclusively at the screen. There were therefore changes of activity which reduced her workload at the equipment.

The employers in this case, the Defendants, did not directly and specifically plan her work or those of any of the other secretaries employed by them. They did, however, note that the situation which I have described was a normal situation for the majority of their employees and they so recorded it in the guidance which they provided to their employees as part of the documentary support material provided following a training course to which I must refer shortly.

It is noted at paragraph 4F of that document that most jobs "incorporate tasks which require the job holder to move away from the keyboard and screen. These should be used as an opportunity to take a break from working at the screen and keyboard and provide a change of posture and a rest for both eyes and hands."

I think it is worth noting at this stage that the particular guidance from which I have been reciting went on to say:

"Mini breaks of, say, thirty seconds used to stretch and move around are helpful".

I think that on the evidence which I have heard I am able to comment that that advice would be misleading, save insofar as it might be relevant to changes in posture as opposed to relief of muscles or tendons which are stretched by the particular exercise of intensive operation of the keyboard.

I am not, however, prepared to find that the Defendants were in breach of Regulation 4 of the regulations, having regard to the "plan" expressed in paragraph 4F of the Plaintiff's document.

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Health and Safety (Display Screen Equipment) Regulations 1992
Regulation 6	Contextual Commentary | Binns - v - Speechly Bircham | Find Other Cases

In the Judgment on the 3rd July 1997, at A on page 9, HH Judge Rich states:

Regulation 6 provides in regard to the provision of training:

"Where a person is already a user on the date of coming into force of these regulations, his employer should ensure that he is provided with adequate health and safety training in the use of any work station upon which he may be required to work".

The Defendants, on the coming into force of the regulations, immediately organised short courses of training for all their existing VDU operators. The Plaintiff, indeed, attended the first such course early in 1993. Each party had proposed to call expert ergonomists who would have given evidence as to appropriate training in these circumstances. They, however, were able to agree that the training appeared satisfactory in the environment. They observed, however, that it remains possible that an individual may not appreciate the implications of all that they are told.

I think that the duty to provide adequate training must be satisfied if adequate training is provided which a person of the intelligence and knowledge of the trainee may reasonably be expected to have followed. If the trainee is inattentive, providing that reasonable efforts are made to obtain her attention and to draw the relevant matters to her attention, I think that there is compliance with the obligation of the regulation.

The training which was offered consisted of a half hour or forty minute description of the requirements of safe and healthy operation of the equipment. It was, as I find, almost entirely directed to an analysis of what is called 'the work station', i.e. the physical equipment, the relationship of the operator to the machine, the correct posture, and the like. In those circumstances, as I find, the reference to the necessity for breaks in the course of the use of the machine was incidental rather than a primary matter. Insofar as Mrs W, who conducted the training, sought to assert more, when she came to give oral evidence, than she had recorded in the written statement which she had first prepared, I do not accept her evidence. The way she puts it was that she explained the need, for example, to avoid resting the wrists on the work surface, and to use wrist pads if that was required. Then she went on,

"I mentioned the need to take regular breaks away from the keyboard and screen".

I think it may be on the verge of consideration whether training so described was adequate in respect of the need for the provision of breaks. I am, however, persuaded by the agreement made between the experts who have got experience of such training, to feel that I should not find, on the balance of probabilities, that there was in fact a breach of Regulation 6.

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Health and Safety (Display Screen Equipment) Regulations 1992
Regulation 7	Contextual Commentary | Binns - v - Speechly Bircham | Find Other Cases

In the Judgment on the 3rd July 1997, at E on page 10, HH Judge Rich states:

There is, however, reliance also on Regulation 7(2) which requires the provision of information. The regulation reads:

"Every employer shall ensure that users at work in his undertaking are provided with adequate information about such measures taken by him in accordance with his duties under..."

and then there is cited Regulation 4 which is the regulation with regard to the planning of activities to which I have already made reference. I do not think that that regulation can possibly be complied with by providing no information. The only possibility of alleging that information was provided is the passage in the guidance contained as part of the training course to which I have already made reference. However, it is not expressed in terms of being a provision of information as to the planning of the daily work routine of the users.

I conclude, therefore, that Regulation 7(2) was not complied with. That, of course, is not the end of the question. Before that finding becomes of any materiality it is necessary to consider whether the breach of the regulation has had at least a significant causative effect upon the injury of which the Plaintiff complains. The Plaintiff tells me, and I accept, that she did not appreciate the significance and purpose of the taking of breaks, and the making of changes of activity. That she was told of this in the course of her training, that she knew that her training was concerned with health and safety, I do not doubt. For the reasons which I have already given, however, I think it is perfectly reasonable to assume that she did not, indeed, understand the context of the training in relation to possible damage to her upper limbs as opposed to the desirability of relieving her posture or resting her eyes.

I do think that if the obligation under Regulation 7(2) had been complied with so that the Plaintiff had been informed that the employee both had a duty to plan her activities so as to ensure interruptions in her workload at the equipment, and had been told that the plan of the employer was that she should use the changes of activities which were inevitable in order to ensure a proper pattern of interruption, her approach to her work would have been different. I do not find as a fact that the periods of intensive work when she was working for Ms S were themselves the cause of her injury. However, I do note that she obtained relief in regard to her pain by so arranging her work that she increased the number of interruptions which she made in frequency, if not in length. That is an approach to her work which she could, and I think would, have made if she had been informed that that was the basis of her employer's plan for appropriate relief of the daily routine at the visual display equipment.

Accordingly, I do find not only that there was a breach of Regulation 7(2), but also that the breach was sufficiently causative of the injury which the Plaintiff suffered as to render the Defendant liable in damages.

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Last updated: 14/05/2013