Armed Forces

(asked on 12th February 2020) - View Source

Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what changes to the duty of care for armed forces personnel have been introduced under the Defence Safety Authority since 2015.


Answered by
Johnny Mercer Portrait
Johnny Mercer
Minister of State (Cabinet Office) (Minister for Veterans' Affairs)
This question was answered on 24th February 2020

The safety and wellbeing of our personnel remains our top priority. Many elements of our training carry risk, and it is regularly assessed and monitored. The Defence Safety Authority (DSA) works in tandem with the new Director of Health Safety and Environmental Protection (D HS&EP), appointed in March 2019, to assist the Permanent Secretary in discharging his HS&EP responsibilities. Since 2015, the DSA has made a significant contribution to the development of the Ministry of Defence's Safety approach, including:

a. Supporting the introduction of the Defence Safety & Environmental Committee (DSEC), chaired by the Permanent Secretary, to improve oversight of the duty of care and risk associated with defence activities;

b. The establishment, in 2016, of a pan-domain standardised approach to Duty Holding for managing hazardous activities that represent a credible and foreseeable Risk to Life. The Duty Holder role being to balance and reduce the risk to as low as reasonably practicable and tolerable with due regard to the strategic benefits required from Defence; and

c. The publication of new guidance and regulations setting out rules and standards for Defence HS&EP, in line with the Defence Secretary's Policy Statement for all HS&EP matters in Defence. These include chapters on the duty holding construct and duty of care on deployments. Those appropriate for the Gov.uk website are available at:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/implementation-of-defence-policy-for-health-safety-and-environmental-protection-dsa-012

Reticulating Splines