Health and Safety

Employers' Information

Health and Safety, Insurance and Police Checks

It is your responsibility, as an employer, to make sure that your employees work safely and have a safe place to work in. It is also the responsibility of the Personal Assistant (PA) not to do anything, which might cause you themselves or others injury or harm. It is important to understand that health and safety is not just the responsibility of the employer but of their staff as well.

This is often a difficult area and communication is the key to success. There is a balance between the safety of the Personal Assistant and getting your needs met and there are laws that need careful interpretation to ensure that you and your employee are not putting each other at unnecessary risk. You must always take practical and reasonable steps to reduce risk in any activity where risk has been identified

At NCIL, we take the view that you are usually the best expert about the safest way to assist you in moving your own self and this should be at the centre of whatever arrangements are in place. If however you feel that you are unsure about the best way to be assisted to move or your needs have changed, then you may consider seeking the advice of a suitably experienced or qualified person. It's essential to remember that employing personal assistants is about having the support you need to live your own life.

As the employer, it is for you and your employees to work out a safe way for tasks to be undertaken, thus reducing risk to a minimum. This could include things like maintaining lifting equipment properly, appropriate training for your staff i.e. food hygiene certificate if their role involves preparing food for you, allowing sufficient time to undertake a task so you are not both rushed. Where you think there may be a risk doing a particular task, it is important that the risk is explored and you decide the safest way to do something. This is sometimes called risk assessment, but it simply means examining a task and establishing what tools and adjustments need to be made, if any, to make the outcome a safe and pleasant experience for all those involved. You should also have information in place for your PA’s in the case of an emergency so that they know what to do i.e. where is the first aid kit and do they know how to use it and where is the nearest phone.

It should not be for your local authority to decide how you deal with health and safety but if there was a risk that was identified in your care plan then your local authority should tell you about it so you can decide the best way to minimise the risk.

"As a general principle, local councils should avoid laying down health and safety policies for individual direct payment recipients." (DOH guidance pg. 24)

"local councils should give recipients the results of any risk assessments" (DOH guidance pg.24)

If you feel you would like some more information or need to ask a question about Health and Safety you can contact your local support service who may be able to help or phone the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) Infoline on 0845 345 0055 or look at their website, they have a section on information for small businesses.

Insurance

The first question that needs to be asked is "why do I need insurance when employing personal assistants"? The simple answer to this is that, as an employer you have a legal duty to insure against accidents or injury to your staff, or accidents or injury caused by them while they are at work for you.

Accidents can happen in a number of ways. For example, your PA might fall down the stairs while doing the housework. Alternatively, they might have an accident outside your house while doing your shopping. If they are involved in a car crash they might also injure someone else. Additionally, your PA might contract an illness, which they might feel is your responsibility - food poisoning, for example, contracted from eating food you have provided. In such cases, as their employer, you might be held responsible. Consequently, when employing a PA you must take out:

Employers' Liability Insurance

This will insure you against your PA having an accident or becoming ill while working for you, in cases where you might be held liable.
and:

Public Liability Insurance

This is needed to insure you against any damage or injury caused to someone else by you, or your PA while they are working for you.

You should also have good comprehensive house insurance to cover your property and its contents although this is not a requirement it is advisable. You might want to include cover for accidental damage. Sometimes PAs can damage your property.

Sometimes `Employer's Liability Insurance' and `Public Liability Insurance' can be included in a comprehensive household policy, however, many standard policies do not cover this, so check carefully.

Insurance can be quite expensive. Your funding agency might help you cover the cost. If you are getting Direct Payments, the local authority must include the cost of Employer's Liability Insurance in the amount it gives you. You should also shop around to get the best terms.

Other insurance you may want to consider might be;

Personal Accident Insurance

It is possible that your PA may inadvertently injure you, for example by spilling a scalding-hot drink on you. Employer's liability insurance will not cover this sort of injury. You can obtain personal accident insurance to cover misadventures of this kind, but this is likely to be very costly; we advise you to take specialist advice if you are thinking about this sort of insurance.

Legal Costs Insruance

If you find yourself in a dispute with your PA, it is possible that they could go to Employment Tribunal. Obtaining legal advice to defend yourself can be costly. There is free advice available from the Citizens Advice Bureau and ACAS but some employers would prefer to be able to use a solicitor. Some insurance policies cover you for some legal expenses and you should check when taking out a policy if it is included and how much you are covered for.

Insurance schemes for employers to pay for legal advice in these circumstances are expensive. However, it may be feasible for groups of employers to take out a joint policy and your local support service may be able to help with this. In some countries PA users employ their PAs through a co-operative and are able to take out a group insurance against legal costs. This may be an idea worth exploring with your local PASS or peer support group. NCIL will be looking into these areas further so check the home page and the newsletter for more information.

If you would like some independent advice about insurance you can contact the British Insurance Brokers Association.

Police Checks (Criminal Records Bureau)

In March 2002 the government introduced new rules in the National Care Standards which require every organisation who provides services to disabled people living in their own home, to check all of their employees with the Criminal Record Bureau. This is to check for any listed previous convictions for a Criminal offence.

As individual employers, Direct Payments users over 16 are not obliged to make these checks on their workers. However it might be advisable to make these checks to help you make decisions about the best people to employ as your personal assistant.

The way that the system works is that individuals need to contact a local organisation who can make the request for the information from the Criminal Records Bureau on their behalf.

Your local Social Services Department will certainly be able to do this or should make sure a simple process is in place. In some areas local voluntary organisations or the Direct Payments Support Schemes may be able to offer this support.

As information is passed through a third party you may not see the actual documents from the Bureau but you will get a report on the general nature of the information that the board has provided.

It is certainly good practice for the local authority to provide you with enough money in your direct payment for you to be able to reimburse your PA’s with the cost of a check and the Department of Health (DOH) suggests in its guidance about direct payments, that this should be a consideration “the local authority may wish to consider the cost of the check... so that the Direct Payment user may reimburse successful candidates” DOH guidance (pg.26)

Police Checks for people working with children.

If you are providing a service to a child the local authority has an obligation to offer a check for any person likely to be employed. Tell people as early as possible in the process that they will need to undergo such a check. The local authority can do the check on your behalf. (For more information see A parent's guide to Direct Payments DOH, Section 6).

You must remember that a CRB check should be just one way that you check that your staff are suitable to work with you and your family. CRB checks are useful but will only reveal relevant convictions up to the date the check was done. You should always take up references for anyone you wish to employ and always try and reduce the risk of putting yourself in a vulnerable position. Regular supervision of your workers is a good way of keeping track of what they are doing and how, and also an opportunity to voice any concerns you may have. If your PA is assisting you with personal correspondence and banking you should have simple procedures in place to protect your confidential and sensitive details and always have a probation period when you employ someone so if you are unhappy or concerned you have a much more straight forward way of stopping their employment with you in the early stages when you are getting to know them and the way in which they work.

If you are unsure about any of the information in this section you should always check out what you are thinking of doing either with NCIL, your local direct payment support service or other suitably qualified organisation, some of which are listed below.

Useful information links to help you in this section: