Lord Young recommends implementation of the Jackson Review

Lord Young's review of Health and Safety laws has advised the government that the recommendations of Lord Justice's Jackson recent review of the civil justice system should be implemented as part of its efforts to combat 'compensation culture'.

The implementation of the Jackson Review is presently the subject of a Ministry of Justice consultation, but Lord Young said that it was his “firm belief” that the Government should adopt Lord Justice Jackson’s proposals “as soon as possible”.

The government said that it accepted the conclusions of Lord Young's report, entitled Common Sense, Common Safety, on the operation of health and safety laws and the growth of the 'compensation culture in full.

The Jackson Review was published in January this year, following an 18 month consultation process with the civil litigation industry, and Jackson's recommendations turned out to be far more radical than many expected.

In respect of personal injury claims, Jackson's recommendations were generally regarded as being more pro-defendant than anticipated and included the abolition of  recoverable success fees and ATE premiums and the introduction of 'one-way' costs shifting in order to reduce the costs burden on the public sector and insurers.

In his report, Lord Young wrote: “If there is one law that Parliament cannot repeal it is the law of unintended consequences, and it is the unintended consequences of well meaning legislation that are at the root of our problems today. The Access to Justice Act 1999 brought about three major changes in the compensation landscape. These were the introduction of conditional fee agreements (CFAs), the growth of after the event (ATE) insurance and the proliferation of claims management companies. The shift towards increased fears of litigation can be seen to have its roots in these changes.”

Other recommendations of the report, which was published today (15th October) were to:

• Give a right for citizens to be able to refer unfair decisions on health and safety grounds to the Ombudsman, and a fast track process should be implemented to ensure that decisions can be over turned within two weeks. If appropriate, the Ombudsman may award damages where it is not possible to reinstate an event. If the Ombudsman’s role requires further strengthening, then legislation should be considered.
• Simplify the process that schools and similar organisations under take before taking children on trips and introduce a single consent form that covers all activities a child may under take during his or her time at a school.
• Introduce a simplified claims procedure for personal injury claims similar to that for road traffic accidents under £10,000 on a fixed costs basis. Explore the possibility of extending the framework of such a scheme to cover low-value medical negligence claims.
• Clarify (through legislation if necessary) that people will not be held liable for any consequences due to well-intentioned voluntary acts on their part.
• Simplify the risk assessment procedure for low hazard workplaces such as offices, classrooms
• and shops. The HSE should create simpler interactive risk assessments for low hazard workplaces, and make them available on its website. Insurance companies should cease the current practice that requires businesses operating in low hazard environments to employ health and safety consultants to carry out full health and safety risk assessments.
• Consult with the insurance industry to ensure that worthwhile activities are not unnecessarily curtailed on health and safety grounds. Insurance companies should draw up a code of practice on health and safety for businesses and the voluntary sector. If the industry is unable to draw up such a code, then legislation should be considered.
• Consolidate health and safety regulations into a single set of accessible regulations.

The prime minister David Cameron said: “Good health and safety is vitally important. But all too often good, straightforward legislation designed to protect people from major hazards has been extended inappropriately to cover every walk of life, no matter how low risk.

“A damaging compensation culture has arisen, as if people can absolve themselves from any personal responsibility for their own actions, with the spectre of lawyers only too willing to pounce with a claim for damages on the slightest pretext.

“We simply cannot go on like this. That’s why I asked Lord Young to do this review and put some common sense back into health and safety. And that’s exactly what he has done.”

Lord Young, a cabinet minister in Margaret Thatcher's government, will now continue to work across Whitehall departments to ensure his recommendations are carried through.

A copy of the full report can found here: http://www.number10.gov.uk/wp-content/uploads/402906_CommonSense_acc.pdf