Following the introduction of the Corporate Manslaughter and Homicide Act 2007, and the Health & Safety Offences Act 2008, the importance of having a robust duty of care policy has accelerated up companies’ priority lists.

However, with the right advice and approach, you can meet your legal obligations quickly and very affordably.

Duty of Care - woman on laptop

Reducing risk

Whether drivers are in company-provided cars and vans, or using their own vehicles for business trips (known as Grey Fleet), it’s not something to be ignored.

The Corporate Manslaughter and Homicide Act 2007 means that companies and organisations can be found guilty of corporate manslaughter as a result of serious management failures resulting in a cross breach of duty of care. The Health and Safety Offences Act 2008 provides courts with greater sentencing powers for those who break health and safety law and, when it was introduced, it increased the penalties from previous laws.

Yet whilst the legal aspect is important, many businesses implementing risk management practices are doing so to save money and create a strong safety culture.

By adopting the right safety measures, such as driving licences checks, risk assessments and driver training – most of these are fairly straightforward, easy to implement and can be completed online – businesses can see accident levels reduced by up to 20%, which is a very sizeable saving indeed.