Secondment
Common Questions

By assessing whether the organisation is 'safety - competent' you are checking that they are able to fulfil the duty of care to your staff. The level of competence should be appropriate to the work that is to be undertaken. The checks should be on the arrangements for managing risk in the organisation.

The organisation is responsible for working safely and in accordance with the law. The BBC is responsible for ensuring that the organisation has the knowledge, skills and experience to do the work safely that is, the organisation is competent in safety.The assessment of competence is part of the discussion between the BBC and the organisation before providing staff on secondment.

The member of staff will need to know the risks associated with the work and how to deal with them so that they are be able to make judgements about the rules/standards and the arrangements that are in place for the control of risk.

As their manager you also need information about any work that requires special qualifications or skills (so that you know whether the staff are competent to carry out the work) and any health surveillance that will be needed (so that you can establish that it is being provided).

The documents that will help you confirm that the organisation has arrangements for managing risk. We may ask them for details of the methods used in dealing with risk assessment, including past practice. All employers, in law, are required to have appropriate Health and Safety arrangements. Where an employer has five employees or more these must be written in a Safety Policy. Smaller companies may not have a written safety policy but they should be able to let you know:

Any concerns about safety should addressed by the organisation. However, if the issues cannot be resolved BBC staff should discuss any concerns with their BBC line manager.