Reply to post: Re: Who are their lawyers?

Re: Who are their lawyers?

I agree, and have upvoted you, but ...

It is simply not possible to write rules to cover every situation. In safety, there is generally (usually enshrined in regulations) a requirement that risks be minimised "so far as reasonably practical" (or as low as reasonably practical, ALARP). Naturally, that leads to "debates" about how low is practical.

As I read the article, the state inspector has decided that the risks are not ALARP - i.e. that it's not reasonable for Amazon to continue subjecting it's workers to the risks. That is always going to be a subjective thing.

Normally, a responsible employer would take the attitude of "OK, I see what you mean there - how about we do [some plan for change] ?". And between them and the regulator, they will agree how far it is reasonable to go.

In this case, Amazon are taking the "we completely disagree and don't want to spend any money" approach. Yup, gready evil employer, blah, blah. But they do have a point that there should normally be a route to challenging the regulator (they do sometimes go too far) without having to sign something admitting criminality.

So yes, there really should be a route for challenge - and let the court decide where the "as low as reasonably practical" line should be drawn. But I'd suggest that if the employer challenges, and loses, and anyone suffers any detriment that would have been avoided by prompt action - then they should really be hung up to dry over it. E.g, Amazon failed to overturn the regulators decision, someone has hurt their back, Amazon should be well and truly stuffed for wilfully exposing the employee to the risk - which in that case has now been demonstrated to have been real.