Safe and Well at Work: Occupational Health and Safety Strategic Framework for NHSScotland

Chapter 4: Governance and Measures

4.1. NHSScotland Boards must demonstrate clear leadership and reassure themselves that governance arrangements in accordance with the Staff Governance Standard are in place to enable accountability at Board level for delivery of occupational health and safety standards. This will ensure that leadership for occupational health and safety is embedded at the very top of the organisation and that occupational health and safety is an integral part of NHSScotland Board staff governance arrangements. Boards should also recognise that clinical occupational health is a clinical specialism, and must be included within clinical governance arrangements.

4.2. As part of embedding governance arrangements, NHSScotland Boards are expected to clarify roles and responsibilities, at every level of the organisation, to ensure high standards of occupational health and safety are delivered. Boards must ensure that, where appropriate, existing local occupational health and safety strategies and plans are reviewed and revised, to ensure consistency with the approach and priorities identified in this strategic framework. They must also ensure there are appropriate monitoring and audit arrangements in place to measure progress and to ensure that risk management and governance arrangements in relation to occupational health and safety are in place and working well, for example through the utilisation of a closed loop health and safety management system.

4.3. At a national level, the Occupational Health and Safety Strategic Forum ( OHSSFor) will play a leading role in facilitating the delivery of high standards of occupational health and safety across NHSScotland through steering implementation, as appropriate, in relation to national delivery of actions, monitoring and evaluation of progress. This should include measuring progress against the four identified priority areas for action (mental health and wellbeing, musculoskeletal disorders, violence and aggression, and slips, trips and falls). OHSSFor will also consider whether any additional guidance or standards are required to assist Boards with implementation, as well as reviewing and, where required, introducing systems for collecting and considering data and evidence, and for gathering good practice and disseminating to other Boards. Over time, OHSSFor will also review the priority areas for action with a view to advising Ministers and the Management Steering Group ( MSG) on whether other priority areas should be adopted. This work will be taken forward, working closely with the Scottish Workforce and Staff Governance Committee ( SWAG).

4.4. In addition to its continuing role as a co-chair of OHSSFor, the Scottish Government will provide the overall policy direction for occupational health and safety for NHSScotland, and ensure that policies and approaches developed and implemented take account of broader government policy.

4.5. This overarching programme of activity will lead to the delivery of a number of outcomes, such as a safer working environment, improved staff health and wellbeing, and improvements in staff attendance. This will be demonstrated through a number of measures of success, such as an increased level of staff engagement and a reduction in incidents across the four priority areas, which in turn can be measured through, for example, the staff survey, sickness absence targets, and the Occupational Health and Safety minimum dataset.

Summary and actions:

• NHSScotland Boards must demonstrate clear leadership and reassure themselves that appropriate governance arrangements via the Staff Governance Standard at Board level are in place to enable accountability at local level for delivery of occupational health and safety standards.
• NHSScotland Boards are expected to clarify roles and responsibilities at every level of the organisation to ensure high standards of occupational health and safety are delivered.
• NHSScotland Boards must ensure that, where appropriate, existing local occupational health and safety strategies and plans are reviewed and revised, to be consistent with the approach and priorities identified in this strategic framework.
• NHSScotland Boards must ensure there are appropriate monitoring and audit arrangements in place to measure progress and to ensure that governance arrangements in relation to occupational health and safety are in place and working well, for example through the utilisation of a closed loop health and safety management system.
• NHSScotland Boards should recognise clinical occupational health as a specialism to be included within clinical governance.
• The Occupational Health and Safety Strategic Forum ( OHSSFor) will play a leading role in facilitating the delivery of high standards of occupational health and safety across NHSScotland, through steering implementation, as appropriate, in relation to national delivery of actions, monitoring and evaluation of progress.
• OHSSFor will consider whether any additional guidance or standards are required to assist NHSScotland Boards with implementation, as well as reviewing and, where required, introducing systems for collecting and considering data and evidence, and for gathering good practice and disseminating to other Boards.
• Over time, OHSSFor will review existing priority areas for action, with a view to advising Ministers and MSG on whether other priority areas should be adopted.
• This work will be taken forward, working closely with the Scottish Workforce and Staff Governance Committee ( SWAG).
• The Scottish Government will provide the overall policy direction for occupational health and safety for NHSScotland, and ensure that policies and approaches developed and implemented take account of broader government policy.