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Sadly every year many people fall victim to accidents that happen within their workplace; accidents that should have been avoided if the correct safety procedures were in place. This is why it is essential that you are familiar with what health and safety is carried out within your workplace. If the correct health and safety isn't in place you become susceptible to accidents and your employer leaves themselves open to possible court action.

Your employer has a duty of care to protect employees while they are undertaking their job in the workplace. They are obliged to carry out risk assessments within the place of work to ensure safety and they must act on the results of these risk assessments in the correct manner. Decisions such as how many first aiders are needed and what kind of first aid equipment and facilities should be provided are the sort of decisions that need to be made when risk assessments are carried out.

As well as these risk assessments your employer must also provide an accident book to employees. This accident book must be used to record any accidents that occur within the workplace, regardless of how minor they were. The reason why this accident book is so important is that it provides a useful record of exactly what happened in case you need time off work or if you wish to claim for compensation later on. Also recording accidents in this way allows your employer to see what went wrong so that the appropriate action can be taken to stop the accident happening again in the future.

If you do have an accident in the work place you must report the accident to your employer and make a note of what happened in the accident book. You should also check your contract of employment to find out information about sick or accident pay. In serious work related accidents, diseases and dangerous incidents your employer must report them to the Incident Contact Centre of the Health and Safety Executive (HSE), or in Northern Ireland the Health and Safety Executive for Northern Ireland (HSENI).

The types of things that your employer must report are as follows:

' Death
' Disease
' Major injuries such as a broken arm or ribs
' Any other injury that stops an employee from doing their normal work for more than three days
' Dangerous incidents such as the collapse of scaffolding or if people are overcome by gas

These aspects must be reported by your employer but if you are the employee who is involved then it is a good idea that you ensure that it has been reported.

It is essential, when it comes to health and safety in the workplace that you cooperate fully with your employer to keep your workplace safe and you must also take responsibility for your own health.

If you have been injured in the workplace, even if your injury is only minor it is highly important that you see a doctor as this way you will have a record of your injuries, which is crucial if you are hoping to make a claim for compensation.