§ Mr. Frank Allaunasked the Secretary of State for Employment what changes have taken place in the number of health and safety inspections for factory workers, the numbers in the field force of inspectors and the frequency of visits on average of factory inspectors; and what recruitment has been planned or cancelled for 1979 and the current year.
§ Mr. MayhewThe number of factory inspectors making visits to factories increased from 603 in April 1974 to 890 in January 1980, comprising 803 inspectors located at area offices and field consultant group offices, and 87 specialist inspectors in headquarters who regularly pay visits in the field. Part of this expansion was to deal with the many workplaces other than factories for which HM Factory Inspectorate became responsible in 1975. The inspectorate no longer distinguishes factories from other workplaces in its statistics so it is not possible to state whether there have been changes in the number of health and safety inspections for factory workers. On the frequency of visits generally, I have nothing to add to the answer I gave to the hon. Member for Keighley (Mr. Cryer) on 8 November 1979.—[Vol. 973, c.260–1.]
Recruitment for both general and specialist inspectors of factories took or is taking place as follows:
1979
- General inspectors, 2 competitions.
- Specialist inspectors, 9 competitions for a variety of specialisms.
- No recruitments were cancelled in 1979.
1980
- Specialist inspectors, 1 competition planned for explosives inspectors.
Decisions about future recruitment to the Factory Inspectorate will be made after the review of programmes and staff resources in the light of the Government's announced policy on cuts in the Health and Safety Executive has been completed by the Executive on behalf of the Health and Safety Commission. Meanwhile further competitions for general inspectors 5W have been held over pending the result of the review.