BOSH SO2 key terms

The legal and moral obligation of an employer to take reasonable steps to protect the health, safety and welfare of workers and others affected by the organisation's activities.

A legal test requiring employers to weigh the severity of a risk against the time, trouble and cost of controlling it, and to act unless control is grossly disproportionate to the benefit.

A structured set of policies, plans, procedures and arrangements used to direct and control an organisation's health and safety risks and performance, typically following a plan-do-check-act cycle.

A written declaration by senior management setting out the organisation's commitment to health and safety, the principles it will follow, and who is responsible for delivering them.

A periodic, senior-level evaluation of the suitability, adequacy and effectiveness of the health and safety management system, using monitoring and audit results to set improvement actions.

A systematic process of identifying hazards, evaluating the likelihood and severity of harm, and deciding what controls are needed to reduce risk to an acceptable level.

Any source, situation or act with the potential to cause harm, injury, ill health or damage, such as a rotating machine part, a chemical, or an unsafe working practice.

The combination of the likelihood that a hazardous event will occur and the severity of the harm it could cause, often expressed as a rating on a risk matrix.

The level of risk that remains after existing or planned controls have been applied, which must be judged acceptable before work proceeds.

The ranked order of risk-reduction measures, from eliminating the hazard and substituting it, through engineering and administrative controls, to personal protective equipment as the last resort.

The most effective control measure, which removes the hazard entirely from the workplace, for example by discontinuing a hazardous process or designing out a manual handling task.

Replacing a hazardous material, process or piece of equipment with a less hazardous alternative, such as swapping a solvent-based paint for a water-based one.

Clothing or equipment worn by a worker to reduce exposure to a hazard, such as gloves, respirators or safety glasses, used where other controls cannot adequately reduce risk.

A regulatory or advisory maximum concentration of a hazardous substance in workplace air, averaged over a stated reference period, that is intended to protect most workers from adverse health effects.

A danger arising from substances or mixtures that can harm health through inhalation, skin contact or ingestion, or that can cause fire, explosion or environmental damage.

A standardised document supplied with a hazardous chemical that describes its hazards, safe handling, first aid, firefighting and disposal measures, and required controls.

A UK-specific risk assessment of work involving hazardous substances that evaluates exposure routes and health effects and records the controls needed to prevent or adequately control exposure.

Permanent damage to the inner ear caused by prolonged or sudden exposure to high noise levels, which is irreversible and usually develops gradually without obvious warning signs.

A group of vascular, neurological and muscular disorders caused by regular use of vibrating hand tools, with symptoms including tingling, numbness and blanching of the fingers.

A work design or task characteristic, such as awkward posture, repetitive movement, forceful exertion or poor workstation layout, that increases the chance of musculoskeletal injury.

Any transporting or supporting of a load by hand or bodily force, including lifting, lowering, pushing, pulling and carrying, which can cause musculoskeletal injury if poorly managed.

A work-related factor such as excessive workload, low control, unclear role, poor support or workplace bullying that can harm mental and physical health.

The adverse physical and psychological response that occurs when the demands of work exceed a person's perceived ability or resources to cope with them.

A living organism or its products, such as bacteria, viruses, fungi or blood-borne pathogens, that can cause infection, allergy or poisoning in exposed workers.

An undesired event that results in, or could have resulted in, injury, ill health, damage or other loss, including near misses as well as accidents with actual harm.

An unplanned event that did not cause injury or damage but had the potential to do so, providing valuable warning information about weaknesses in controls.

A structured investigation method, such as the five whys or a fishbone diagram, used to trace an incident back to underlying system failures rather than immediate actions alone.

A measure taken to eliminate the cause of a detected nonconformity or incident and prevent recurrence, as distinct from immediate containment or corrective repair.

The UK Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations, which require employers to report specified work-related deaths, injuries, diseases and dangerous occurrences to the enforcing authority.

A work-related injury, reportable under RIDDOR, that keeps a worker unable to perform their normal duties for more than three consecutive days, excluding the day of injury.

The planning, training, equipment and arrangements an organisation puts in place so it can respond effectively to fires, spills, medical emergencies and other disruptive events.

A documented set of procedures describing how an organisation will detect, respond to and recover from emergencies, including roles, alarms, escape routes and communication arrangements.

A planned rehearsal of an emergency escape procedure used to test alarms, routes, assembly arrangements and worker competence, and to identify improvements before a real event.

A programme of regular health checks or screening for workers exposed to specific hazards, intended to detect early signs of work-related ill health and trigger protective action.

A hearing test used in health surveillance to measure a worker's hearing threshold and detect early noise-induced hearing loss before it becomes disabling.

A systematic, independent examination of an organisation's health and safety arrangements against defined criteria, used to verify conformity and identify improvement opportunities.

A proactive performance measure, such as the number of inspections completed or training hours delivered, that reflects preventative activity and predicts future safety outcomes.

A reactive performance measure based on outcomes that have already occurred, such as injury rates or lost-time incidents, which shows results but not the strength of preventive controls.

A quantifiable measure selected to track progress towards a specific health, safety or environmental objective and to inform management decisions about priorities and resources.

The branch of healthcare concerned with the relationship between work and health, covering fitness for work, prevention of work-related illness and rehabilitation of workers.

The process of selecting, inducting, supervising and reviewing external organisations and workers so that they meet the host organisation's health, safety and environmental standards.

A formal written authorisation that specifies the precautions required before and during high-risk work, such as hot work or confined space entry, and records who has authorised it.

The ongoing process of identifying, assessing and addressing health, safety, human rights and environmental risks associated with suppliers and business partners.

An element of an organisation's activities, products or services that interacts or can interact with the environment, such as emissions, waste generation or water use.

Any change to the environment, whether adverse or beneficial, wholly or partly resulting from an organisation's environmental aspects, including pollution, resource depletion and habitat change.

Meeting present needs without compromising the ability of future generations to meet theirs, balancing environmental protection, social wellbeing and economic viability in business decisions.